


Family Reunions

by The_Bisexual_From_Hell



Series: Unprodigal Daughter [1]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019), Station 19 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, I save Lucas by giving Vic a serial killer dad, Night Terrors, Panic Attacks, Tags May Change, that makes sense when you read it trust me, this is niche and self-indulgent, this is the crossover you didn't knew you needed, travic hugs galore, vic is the Whitly's adopted daughter yay, watching prodigal son is not needed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-16 04:28:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 21,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28825221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/The_Bisexual_From_Hell/pseuds/The_Bisexual_From_Hell
Summary: “I need a consult,” Vic knows Dr. Pierce is one of the best cardiothoracic surgeons in the world, she had saved Travis, and she knows Dr. Pierce is Lucas’ best shot at survival. Vic Hughes knows this. Victoria Whitly—a part of herself she wants dead—is scared and wants her dad to make her feel safe like he did when she was terrified of the monster in the closet, long before she found out the only monster in the house was her father.Martin ‘The Surgeon’ Whitly may be a monster, a serial killer, her tormentor, that doesn’t make him any less of a world-renowned cardiothoracic surgeon.OrVictoria Hughes used to be Victoria Whitly. To save her fiancé, Lucas Ripley's life, she must talk to her father, Martin Whitly, infamous serial killer even if that means getting tangled in his web of lies and murder once again.
Relationships: Victoria Hughes & Travis Montgomery, Victoria Hughes/Lucas Ripley
Series: Unprodigal Daughter [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2113485
Comments: 91
Kudos: 57





	1. The Call

**Author's Note:**

> Listen this is the most niche shit ever and I'm sure only like 3 people will read it, but if you do read it, I hope you enjoy the deranged crap I came up with. I'm sorry for any mistakes, English isn't my first language, and my only beta is Grammarly.
> 
> Watching Prodigal Son is not necessary, I’ll explain things throughout the story. 
> 
> Still, I’ll give you a rundown of the basics; the series centers on Malcolm Bright, whose father, Martin Whitly, is the infamous serial killer known as "The Surgeon". As a child, Malcolm was responsible for enabling the police to arrest his father, and has not seen his father in ten years after joining Quantico. A disgraced former FBI profiler who now works for the NYPD, Malcolm is forced to confront his father after a copycat serial killer uses Whitly's methods of killing. He finds himself drawn back into constant contact with his father as he must both use Whitly's insights to help the police solve particularly horrible crimes and battle his own inner demons.
> 
> Now on to insert Victoria Hughes into the narrative to mash my comfort shows together.

Lucas is in the hospital, he might be dying. 

The man she is ready to spend the rest of her life with is in critical condition. 

Victoria makes a phone call. 

A call she has been avoiding for years, to a life she left behind. 

“Victoria,” The voice over the phone sounds awfully gleeful, it sends chills down her spine. 

“Hi, Dad,” She tries to keep her voice steady, but they can both hear it waiver. “I need your help,” 

“Well, anything for my girl.” She can practically hear his smile over the phone. He’s been waiting for this phone call for years, waiting for her to need him again. 

“I need a consult,” Vic knows Dr. Pierce is one of the best cardiothoracic surgeons in the world, she had saved Travis, and she knows Dr. Pierce is Lucas’ best shot at survival. Vic Hughes knows this. Victoria Whitly—a part of herself she wants dead—is scared and wants her dad to make her feel safe like he did when she was terrified of the monster in the closet, long before she found out the only monster in the house was her father. 

Martin ‘The Surgeon’ Whitly may be a monster, a serial killer, her tormentor, that doesn’t make him any less of a world-renowned cardiothoracic surgeon. 

“You sound worried Victoria, who is this consult for?” Martin sounds every bit the concerned father, it makes Victoria want to puke. 

“My fiancé,” There’s no use in lying to him, he knows her too well. “He has Aortic Stenosis and Hydrofluoric acid poisoning,” 

“Oh my, that’s not good, both of those things are serious on their own” Martin is delighted, he’ll have to thank this very ill fiancé for bringing Victoria back to him, his prodigal daughter. “Send over the files and the test results, can’t have your fiancé dying before he gets to meet this soon to be father-in-law,”

Victoria wants to scream, her father named his price, he’ll save Lucas if he gets back in on her life. If she were a better person, Victoria would hang up the phone and let her father rot in jail, she wouldn’t submit Lucas to the experience that will be meeting The Surgeon. Victoria is selfish, she’s a Whitly, so she’ll pay the price, she’ll get ready for a family reunion. 

Jennifer and Dr. Pierce are talking about palliative care when she finds them. Victoria knows the only reason that Lucas is not dead right now is that Jennifer got to Grey-Sloan in time to stop him from leaving, still, things don’t look good. 

“Dr. Pierce, I need his files and test results,” Vic Hughes can feel Victoria Whitly take over for now, it’s a defense mechanism. 

“Can I ask why?” Dr. Pierce probably knows the reason, when a loved one is dying, you often look for a second option to try and save them, besides help couldn’t hurt. 

“I called in a favor for a consult with Dr. Martin Whitly,” 

“That’s one hell of a favor you cashed in.” Maggie knows who that is, before he was caught, Dr. Whity was a surgical legend, a cardio god. Only the ultra-rich and corrupt people can afford consultations with Dr. Whitly. Besides, almost no one wants a serial killer to consult.

“Who is Dr. Whitly?” Jennifer asks, she was all the best hands on deck for her brother, and if Vic can do that, then she’ll love her even more. 

“He’s the best, a surgical legend,” Victoria replies, before flashing Jennifer a smile that looks more like a grimace. “He also happens to be a notorious serial killer.” 

Victoria decides no one needs to know he is her father yet. 

As far as people in her life knew, her parents lived in Seattle and own a restaurant, it’s not a lie, those are her biological parents. Martin and Jessica Whitly adopted her when she was less than a year old, back when they thought they couldn't have biological kids. Her brother Malcolm was born a year and a half later, their sister Ainsley had been born five years after that. 

“A serial killer? Really?” Jennifer practically screams. 

“I know, listen I don’t like this either, trust me I hate it more than you do, and Dr. Pierce is an incredible surgeon, but I want Lucas to have the best chance at survival, and that means getting help from a serial killer” Vic knows this is a horrible situation, that no one is going to like it, usually good people don’t get help from a serial killer. 

“If you can get him to agree to be treated by a serial killer, then do it, but we both know he’ll hate this more than I do,” Jennifer doesn’t have it in her to fight with Vic, she’s only trying to help, but that doesn’t mean she’s going to like this. 

Dr. Pierce sends an intern to send the files over to Claremont Psychiatric Hospital and they head over to his room together. Lucas is laying on the bed looking frailer than Vic ever thought possible, he is still conscious, Dr. Pierce has him on a calcium gluconate drip to neutralize and minimize the effects of the acid. 

Vic grew up her whole life learning about how the body works, and how surgeries were performed, her dad read her a children book and told her about whatever surgery he had done that day, as her bedtime ritual. She knows that the effects of the acid were caught early, and the drip is working, but if the damage is extensive, then surgery he needs for his heart could be too risky and it might kill him. 

“Your calcium levels are looking better, the fluid building up in your lungs is not too much,” Dr. Pierce breaks the silence. “However, it will probably continue to build up for a while, and your best chance at making it out of this, is getting intubated soon, you might want to reconsider your DNI,” 

“I don’t want to be intubated,” His voice sounds coarse. 

“Please, just do it for Jennifer, for me.” Vic knows Jennifer won’t push the issue, so she will. “You don’t get to say yes to my proposal and then not marry me, so please get rid of the DNI and I promise I’ll take you off the ventilator if you’re not getting better.” 

Lucas gives a weak nod, he’ll do anything for Victoria and he trusts her to know when to pull the plug if necessary.

“I need to talk to him alone, can I have a few minutes?” Vic sounds small, she hates herself for it. Jennifer and Pierce exchange a look. 

“We’ll be back soon, we’re just going to get the paperwork to get rid of the DNI,” Pierce says softly, she has no idea what Victoria did to get the appointment with Whitly, but she knows it can’t be good, judging by the way it's weighing her down. 

Lucas looks at her expectantly. 

“I’m sorry,” She says as she walks over to the chair and takes his hand. 

“For what sweetheart?” Lucas might die soon, and if he does, he does not want to leave her feeling guilty over anything. 

“I called my father,” Vic explained. Lucas is the only person in Seattle that knows about her parents, about her father. He found out about it one night when her night terrors had gotten out of control after a bad shift. 

_Lucas had been woken up by Vic whimpering and thrashing in her sleep, she was covered in a thin layer of sweat._

_“MALCOLM,” She screamed. His heart broke for her, he knew what a night terror was, he had seen them before, they weren’t uncommon in firefighters, he had had a couple of his own, none this bad._

_“Eggy,” He whispered softly, and backed away from the bed, knowing that trying to wake her or touch her might make it worse. “It’s okay sweetheart, you’re okay, you’re safe, I’ve got you,”_

_"_ _P_ _lease, Dad, don’t hurt him,” She stuttered._

_“Your dad isn’t here, Toria, he can’t hurt you,” Lucas was surprised to find this wasn’t related to firefighting, he had known about the incident with blue fire and her fear of fire. “It’s just you and me Eggy, you and me, in your Seattle apartment, you’re safe.”_

_Lucas had to physically intervene when Victoria got out of bed and headed for the fire escape. He got a hold of her waist and walked her back to the bed, she struggled against him. It took several minutes of reassurance which didn’t do much, for her night terror to pass and for her to go limp in his arms._

_Waking up the next morning, Vic felt like shit, anxiety bubbled up in her chest, restlessness settled within her. Lucas wasn’t in the bed, she could hear him in the kitchen._

_“I had night terror didn’t I?” Her voice sounds defeated._

_“You did,” Lucas doesn’t seem upset, if anything he seems worried._

_“I’m sorry,” If Vic’s mind were thinking rationally, she would know he’s just concerned for her because he loves her._

_“Don’t apologize, it wasn’t your fault,” He hesitated “Does this happen a lot?”_

_“It used to, not so much anymore, did I say anything?” Vic remembers being a kid, she used to get night terrors too, except when she was a child, her dad would calm her down from them, he would make her tea, and talk about magical worlds until she fell asleep again. Now she’s an adult and he’s the one causing them._

_“You screamed the name Malcolm and asked your dad not to hurt someone,”_

_“Of course I did, it’s always the same damn thing, why should this time be any fucking different?” Vic was angry, she was so angry at her father for screwing her up._

_“Do you want to talk about it?” Lucas asked softly, he could tell this was a sensitive topic. Victoria did not want to talk, not at all, she wanted to go to work and pretend it didn’t happen. She couldn’t do that, he had seen her have a night terror and hadn’t left, he loved her, he made her feel safe._

_“My father is categorically not a good person, it’s why he’s been in prison since I was 12,” Vic decides to start, she has no idea how you’re supposed to tell your boyfriend that your father is a serial killer._

_“I thought your parents owned a Polish restaurant?” He replies confused, they had been to her parents’ restaurant for take out, although he supposes that the man that served them could have been her step-father._

_“My biological parents do, I met them when I was 18, it was part of the reason I moved to Seattle, I was adopted by my mom and dad before I turned one, they are the only real parents I’ve ever known,” This was uncharted territory, no one knew about her dad in Seattle, not even Travis, she had been trying to bury Victoria Whitly for so long. “I was born Victoria Hughes, I grew up Victoria Whitly, I changed my name years ago to get away from him”_

_“Whitly, that sounds familiar,” Lucas knows he’s heard that name before, something to do with New York, probably embezzlement._

_“My father is Martin Whitly, also known as The Surgeon, one of the most infamous serial killers of the 20th century,”_

_“Oh,” It clicks in his brain, Martin Whitly had killed at least 23 women in horrific ways before getting apprehended by the police, he had gotten the plea deal of the century. Lucas remembers seeing it on the news when he was still an unranked firefighter,_

_“I understand if you want to leave now, you didn’t sign up for a relationship with the daughter of a serial killer, you fell for Vic Hughes, not for Victoria Whitly”_

_“You’re not your father Victoria, you’re good, you’re so good, I’m not going anywhere. I fell in love with you because you’re the best person I know, I love you no matter what your last name is, you’re always Eggy to me.”_

_“I love you too,” Her words sound so laced with relief. He wraps her in a hug and holds her tight._

_“Who’s Malcolm?” He asks, hoping he’s not overstepping._

_“My baby brother, he’s the one that really took the brunt of our father’s perverseness, he’s the one that called the police on him, I miss him, it’s been a long time since I’ve seen him” Victoria loves Malcolm so much, she hadn’t seen much of him since she moved to Seattle and he started working for the FBI._

_“Your father is in prison Vic, he can’t hurt you anymore,”_

_“Martin Whitly is not to be underestimated, he can hurt his children any time from any place, there’s no escaping the damage he’s done,” Victoria knows no matter how much therapy she goes to, how much time passes, or how many miles she puts between them, her dad will haunt her forever. “I mean look at me, I haven’t talked to him in ten years, I’ve spent a fortune on therapy and medication, and he still fucking haunts my dreams,”_

_“You were going for the fire escape, I had to pull you back,” He doesn’t know how to comfort her because it's true, the trauma her father caused will stay with her forever, even if it's manageable most of the time._

_“I don’t get night terrors that often anymore, maybe once every couple of months, I used to have them every day. Usually, they happen after a bad shift, it takes a really bad shift to trigger one where I actually walk,” Yesterday, she had been on Aid Car, they had been called away to help a victim of a stab wound, it had reminded her too much of Paul and the cabin._

_“If I hadn’t been here to hold you back…” He trails off._

_“I know, I think it’s time to use the restraints again,” Victoria didn’t need the restraints most nights, not like Malcolm needed them every night, however, night terrors this bad usually never came alone, that meant she was going to have a shit couple of weeks._

_“Restraints?”_

_“I can’t hurt myself or you if I’m tied to the bed Luke,”_

“Why would you do that Eggy?” Lucas doesn’t know many details about what went down with her father, she doesn’t like to talk about it, but he knows enough. He has seen what Martin Whitly is capable of doing to his own daughter.

“Because he can help you, and you mean the world to me, Lucas,” Vic thinks Lucas is an idiot if he thinks she won’t do anything to save him. 

“I’m not worth the pain talking to you father will bring you, I don’t want him to hurt you anymore,” 

“It’s too late for that now, so let me help you so that the price I paid was worth it,” 

He nods, there’s no point in refusing, even if the thought of Victoria calling her father after everything he had done makes his gut churn more than the acid had. 

“Please don’t tell them he’s my father, please let me remain Vic Hughes, Victoria Whitly needs to stay dead a little longer,” She’s pleading, and he hates every second of it, no one should have the power to make Victoria Hughes crumble like this.


	2. The Fallout

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria deals with the fallout of calling her father.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look at that two chapters in two days, don't get used to it, won't happen often. Enjoy.

“He agreed to the consult, we said our goodbyes, let me know when he’s intubated,” Vic’s words were barely audible, she makes sure Jennifer and Dr. Pierce heard her before practically running down the hallway. 

She felt as if someone had put her brain on autopilot, she had no control, Vic felt trapped in her own body. Within 24 hours, she had gotten engaged to Lucas, he had collapsed and almost died, was now in critical condition, and she had called her father.  
  


Vic Hughes could feel bits and pieces of Victoria Whitly bubble up in her chest. It had taken so much time to bury the person she used to be, to bury the past, to bury her father and pretend she was nothing more than a normal person. 

It had been ten years since she had talked to her father, a fucking decade trying to free herself from the grip he had on her soul. It had taken a single phone call for everything to come crumbling down. 

**dad said you called him**

**Victoria, what on earth possessed you to call your father? I thought maybe you would be the one child of mine that would stay away from that monster.**

**i thought you were never going to speak to him again**

Malcolm, Mom, and Ainsley text her respectively. Victoria has no idea how she’s going to explain this mess to them. Actually, her mom might be moved enough by the fact that she’s engaged and at least one of her kids can maintain a stable relationship to overlook the fact that Victoria is seemingly rekindling her relationship with her father.

Not that any of them are completely innocent. Malcolm had been talking to their father since he had gotten fired from the FBI and started working for the NYPD. Which led to their mother talking to Martin begging him not to break Malcolm (Vic thought that was laughable, Martin Whitly had broken her and Malcolm so much, it had taken years to pierce themselves back together, and the cracks were still visible). Ainsley had followed the pattern, not wanting to be left behind, talking to a father she couldn’t remember (Vic thought that was stupid, Ains was free from his twisted mind games, why would she voluntarily get herself into them). And now here was Vic, ready to go home to New York and play house with a serial killer. 

_“I’m leaving,” Two words that were bound to set her father off._

_“I would expect you to, you’ve been here for hours, Victoria and I’m the only one that lives here,” Martin replied while fiddling with his chains, the definition of a wolf in sheep’s clothing._

_“No, Dad, I’m leaving New York,”_

_“You can’t leave New York,” He’s getting agitated, it surprises her more than it should, usually he is calm and collected and projects a suffocating aura of warmth that makes Vic feel like she's burning alive._

_“This is the last time I’ll visit you,” Victoria forces herself to look him in the eye. “Malcolm left for Quantico last week, I was only visiting you for him,”_

_“HOW DARE YOU?” Martin bellows._

_“You told me yourself Dad, it’s my job to protect Malcolm, and now he’s safe from you, I can finally live my life,” Victoria had never been enthusiastic about visiting their father, only Malcolm had and where Malcolm went, Victoria followed. It’s something Martin had engraved into her at the tender age of twelve, she needed to keep Malcolm and Ainsley safe, it was her duty as their big sister._

_“I’m your father Victoria you can’t do this,” He’s acting like the victim now, she knows all his tricks by now. “Your brother left for Quantico after everything I taught you two, he betrayed me, betrayed us, you don’t need to do this."_

_Malcolm had told her that during his last visit Martin had gotten volatile, ranting and raving about how Malcolm had betrayed his life by dedicating himself to catching killers instead of being one. Destroying the family legacy and whatnot. Victoria had not expected the same reaction for her, their father had always viewed Malcolm as his heir, his prodigal son, Victoria had always been his protector._

_Malcolm didn’t need protection from the world, her protection always came in the form of shielding him from their father as much as she could. Now that her brother had vowed to never see their father again, Victoria was no longer needed. It was time to be her own person and that was something she couldn’t do in New York. She had graduated from NYU two years ago, and had been working on Broadway ever since (hey nepotism was nice!) so she knew moving to Seattle could be considered a downgrade, but not to her._

_“Goodbye, Dad,”_

_“VICTORIA,”_

_She turns away and starts walking._

_“YOU’LL COME BACK, YOU NEED ME, MY GIRL,”_

_She forces herself not to look back, he will not see her tears._

_“YOU CAN’T RUN AWAY FROM WHO YOU ARE VICTORIA WHITLY,”_

_She barely hears the door lock behind her over the sound of her heart pounding in her ears._

It took crashing into Andy to bring her back to reality, away from the past. 

“You okay?” Andy asks, concerned, her hands move to Vic’s shoulders to steady her. Victoria cannot reply. “Vic, eyes on me, let's go you need the crying closet,” 

Vic lets Andy guide her by the hands, not bothering to question anything, no matter if Lucas lives or dies, there’s not containing the storm she just unleashed on her life. Her therapist is going to kill her. 

Andy has never seen Vic act this way, it worries her. Ripley is in critical condition and apparently he and Vic have been in a relationship for months now, serious enough to get engaged, serious enough for Vic to be the one to actually propose. Things could crumble for Vic or they could work out and she would get married to the love of her life. Make it or break it.

Andy does not envy her at the moment. 

The crying closet is empty. 

Vic feels her knees buckle, and the sobs wrack through her body. 

She’s having a panic attack. 

The closet reminds her too much of her father’s cell. Her throat feels like it’s constricting, breathing is labored, her chest feels tight. Her hand starts trembling (She had picked that one from Malcolm) the world blurs around her. 

“Panic attack,” She manages to blurt out. 

“Breath, Vic,” Andy says as she kneels next to her, being careful not to touch Vic. “Hey, hey focus on me, breath with me, in and out,” 

Vic hadn’t had a panic attack since the blue fire incident. Back then, it wasn’t just because she was afraid of fire, it was because she was also afraid of how much she loved it, how alive it made her feel, even when it was killing her. 

_You can’t run away from who you are Victoria Whitly_ her mind whispers. The thrill fire gave her needed to be kept under control.

She needed to be in control and right now that was not an option. 

Lucas was hurt, she can’t control if he dies or not. 

She made a deal with the devil, she might fall under his thumb again. 

The life she has built in Seattle will crumble, her team will never look at her the same way if they find out. 

The nausea worsens and bile threatens to rise up her throat. 

“You’re slipping away, eyes on me, focus on me and only me Vic,” 

“In,” 

Deep breath. 

“Out,” 

Exhale. 

“In,” 

Deep breath. 

“Out,” 

Exhale. 

They repeat that process over and over for the better part of ten minutes, by the end of minute nine, Vic is clinging to Andy like she’s her only lifeline. Panic attacks always take so much energy out of her, she just wants to go home and sleep, but she knows that will entail night terrors and nightmares. Her restraints sure are paying off, Vic has a feeling they’re going to become a constant in her life again, just like her father. 

“Thanks, Andy,” 

“You good to face the world?” 

“Always,” The mask fell back on, she needed to face what laid beyond the door, a sick fiancé, the potential implosion of her team at 19, whatever the fuck HR decided to do, and a murderous family reunion. 

She could do it, she had survived a serial killer father trying to kill her at the age of 12. 

She had survived the constant visits to said serial killer father. 

She had survived the blue fire. 

She had survived the skyscraper.

She hadn’t just survived, she had thrived and she was not letting anyone take that away from her without a fight. 

Vic Hughes went into that closet, Victoria Whitly came out of it. 

Andy doesn’t know what just happened, one second Vic was having a panic attack, and the next she’s acting like things are perfectly normal. That’s a scary good level of compartmentalizing, Andy can’t decide if she's impressed, worried, or both. 

Still, at this point there’s not much Andy can do for Vic, except to support her in whatever way she may need. Seeing as Ripley’s death is not imminent (Yet.) most firefighters that came to get tested for hydrofluoric acid or to pay their respects to the Chief have now left. Ben had managed to get all of their team into an attendings’ lounge to wait. 

“Do you need to go be with Ripley?”

“No, he’s probably getting intubated as we speak, I need my family,” Vic replies, and it scares her a little that she doesn’t know what family she’s referring to, the station or the Whitlys. “Besides—” 

Malcolm’s special ringtone interrupts. She picks up without even thinking about it, she always picks up when Malcolm calls. 

“Hey,” Vic answers. 

“You sound tired,” Malcolm doesn't even bother saying hello, not tonight, not when she decided to talk to their father. 

“Pot meet kettle,” Vic knows damn well Malcolm sleeps less than her, and he is always exhausted. 

“I’m serious,” He sounds so worried for her, it breaks her heart a little bit, she’s the older sister, she’s supposed to be the one that worries for him (she does, Vic worries about Malcolm and Ainsley every day).

“I had a panic attack, on top of an already shitty day,” She sighs, it’s really been a horrible day, and if anyone can understand what she’s feeling, it’s him. 

“Dad?” He inquires, even if he already knows the answer. 

“Yeah, bastard still fucks with me,” They both think that truer words have never been spoken.

“Then why did you call him?” He’s genuinely clueless as to why she called him, Martin had refused to tell him, and he couldn’t think of a single reason why she would want to talk to their father. 

“I needed his help, a consult for my fiancé” Again, there’s no point in lying, Malcolm can read her better than their father. She doesn’t know if it's because they grew up together or if it's a profiler thing. 

“Fiancé? Mom and Ainsley are going to kill you for telling me first.” Malcolm says as he recovers from his shock, he’s happy for her of course, still, the thought of her with a fiancé was bizarre. They clearly needed to work on their communication skills. 

“That’s what you’re focusing on?” She smiles for the first time that night. 

“Talking to dad, I figured with the rest of us doing it, it was a matter of time.” He tells her with a heavy heart “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry,” 

“Yeah, me too, I had a fun decade without him.” She might go as far as calling it the best decade of her life, even if the first 10 years of her time on this earth were untouched by murder. 

“What’s wrong with your fiancé?” He knows it’s bad, she wouldn’t have called their father otherwise.

“Aortic Stenosis, and hydrofluoric acid poisoning, it’s not looking good and he can’t really do much, but after all these years, I’m still a girl running to her father when she’s scared,” 

“He fucked us up pretty hard, god I hate him,” Malcolm pauses for a second, his job is his coping mechanism, but there isn’t anything he wouldn’t do for Vic. “You need me to go to Seattle?” 

“I’m good, thanks Malcolm,”

“Spill, what’s your fiancé’s name,” Malcolm has heaps of trust issues, they come with having a serial killer father and being gaslight for most of your life, he’s going to make damn sure this guy is good enough for his sister. 

“Why? You gonna run a background check?” She teases him, they both know he will do exactly that. “Lucas Ripley, he’s the Fire Chief of Seattle,”

“Oh forbidden affair with your boss, the media is going to eat this up,” He jokes. 

“Ainsley is going to be so mad I didn’t tell her I was seeing anyone,” Their little sister loves gossip, she is a reporter after all. “Mom might not kill me, but she is so going to make a prenup,”

“To be fair, her husband did end up being a serial killer, and we’re rich,” Malcolm and Jessica have been getting along better lately, still he knows better than anyone how intense their mother can be. 

“Mhm, I suppose. I gotta go, Malcolm, call you later,” Vic hasn’t eaten in so long, and with the panic attack and the concern for Lucas she might pass out if she doesn’t eat soon. 

“Love you,” He says, Vic is one of the only people he’ll say it so freely to. 

“Love you too,” She hangs up the phone and looks up to see Andy staring at her with confusion clear as day on her face. 

“Care to explain?” Andy is trying not to be mad at Vic, she really is, but apparently, she has been keeping a secret relationship with Ripley for months and by the sounds of that phone call, it’s not the only thing she's hiding. Victoria Hughes was not supposed to be good at keeping secrets. 

“Shit,” Vic doesn’t know if she’s emotionally capable of explaining things to Andy. She’ll try her best and hope Andy understands it's been a hard day. “My dad, not the one the owns the restaurant, that’s my biological father. I’m talking about my adoptive dad, he’s a shit person that did shit things but he might be able to help Lucas and I’ll take any help I can get at this point. Talking to him brought back bad things” 

“Who was on the phone?” Andy asks because Vic sounds miserable when talking about her father but whoever was on the phone made her smile for the first time today.

“My brother Malcolm,” Vic really does not want to explain anything else at the moment “I know I kept things from you, but right now you just held me through a panic attack I don’t have the energy to do this, can I please explain some other time?” 

“Okay, but you will explain things at some point,” Andy lets her off the hook because it’s true, Vic has had a rough night and Andy isn't about to make it worse. “Let’s go grab something to eat.” 

**Pierce says she needs to talk to us**

Jennifer texts her, and Vic knows she won't be eating for a while. 


	3. The Secret

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Victoria deals with the fact that her secret won't remain a secret for long.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was really fun to write even if it took longer than I would have liked. 
> 
> Enjoy.

They meet Dr. Pierce in the attendings’ lounge. When she gets there, Sullivan is holding Jennifer in a tight hug, neither of them is crying, Vic takes it as a good sign. She takes a moment to truly take in the room, her entire team is still in their uniforms, Maya and Dean are still slightly covered in ashes from doing the coffee plant overhaul. 

Vic immediately walks towards Travis, he opens his arms for her and she's nuzzling into his chest, it’s an awkward position because she's almost as tall as him, but it doesn’t matter to either of them. 

At the station, she’s everyone's little sister, it’s a nice change of pace from being the big sister that has to clean up after her siblings. Victoria loves Malcolm and Ainsley, and she knows none of them do it on purpose, it’s just been the routine they always had, Ainsley mostly takes care of herself, and Vic takes care of Malcolm. 

At least that’s how it had been for the first two decades of her life. _You're his big sister Victoria, you need to keep your brother safe, that's your job_ Martin’s voice rang in her mind. Under any other circumstances, Vic hated agreeing with her father, and truth be told, she hated the responsibility that came from being Malcolm’s protector, she was more than a tool for her father’s deranged ideas of turning her and Malcolm into a murder duo. 

However, her brother tended to be an easy target for people, which meant Vic needed to intervene. One time, during Malcolm’s senior year in high school, the first year without her there to look out for him, he had been locked in a closet for three days by other students, and no one had noticed. She had been the one that realized he wasn’t answering his phone, the one that had raced to the school and found him, the one that gave everyone involved a black eye. 

“I spoke to Dr. Whitly,” Dr. Pierce’s voice snapped her back to reality. “We both agreed to keep him intubated, and on calcium gluconate, while incorporating a Hexafluorine treatment, that should completely neutralize the hydrofluoric acid,” 

“He’s going to be okay?” Jennifer’s voice was shaky. 

“At this point, it’s uncertain, we got lucky we caught it in time, but the damage done is still more than I’d like, I’m sorry I wish I could give you better news,” 

“What about the Aortic Stenosis?” Vic spoke softly, still from Travis' arms.

“We’re monitoring it, for now, there’s nothing we can do except help reduce the strain the acid took on his heart, when he is stable enough I’ll have to do a balloon valvuloplasty, in order to fix his aortic valve. It’s not a permanent solution but it’s enough to give his body time to recover from the acid for a couple of months before I can go in for a valve replacement.” Dr. Pierce explained gently to them. 

“Who’s Dr. Whitly?” Ben chimed in, seeing as the medical update on Ripley was done, “I don’t know anyone that works here with that name, but it sounds familiar,” 

“Dr. Whitly was brought in as a private consultant, at Victoria’s request” 

“Vic, only my parents call me Victoria,” She replied numbly. Dr. Pierce winced, and Vic knew she was fucked. 

“At Vic’s request,” Dr. Pierce continued, “Claremont Psychiatric Hospital said they’ll have him ready to take any calls or pass any necessary information along, I’ll be sending him the same updates that I’ll give you.” 

“Psychiatric Hospital? Why would anyone working at a Psychiatric Hospital be helping with a cardiac problem” Sullivan pressed, he was really worried about Lucas. 

Dr. Pierce didn’t know how to answer that, she just looked at Vic.

“He doesn't work at Claremont,” Vic found herself replying, “He’s serving twenty-three life sentences there” 

“Dr. Whitly as is Dr. Martin Whitly serial killer known as 'The Surgeon'? As in one of the most infamous serial killers _ever_?” Dean cut in, he was a true crime buff (the podcasts are really good filler for cleaning the houseboat) of course he knows who Dr. Whitly was, he just didn’t know how he fits into this. 

“Do you know any other Dr. Whitly’s who are serving twenty-three life sentences? Of course that Dr. Whitly,” Vic snapped at him, and immediately regretted it. Her day had been going horrible and talking to her father had definitely put her on edge, but her team had been nothing but supportive and caring. “Sorry, I’m having a bad day, but that doesn’t mean I get to be a bitch to you,” 

According to her therapist, communicating her moods and needs was a good way to break out of her habit of taking care of people and putting them before herself. Plus it was supposed to help her understand her own emotions better or something. 

“Why do you want him consulting? Dr. Pierce is the best, she saved my life,” Travis asked her softly and without judgment, as he stroked her back in a caring way. 

“I don’t know, I’m incredibly desperate and my fiancé might die?” She mumbled. 

“How did you even get a consult with him?” Maya asked, confusion and disgust clear in her voice.

“I cashed in a favor, from an old acquaintance I have back in New York,” Victoria hated that she lied so much these days, about Lucas about her family. Her entire life since her father’s arrest had been spent trying not to lie or deceive people, because that's what her father had done, and she didn’t want to be like him. She had told Miller about his birthday party, she couldn't keep that secret in. Still, her mind wondered if she was just pretending she couldn’t deceive. It seems like another inescapable part of her, lying was something she was good at if she needed to be. 

“You should go home, there’s nothing you can do right now,” Dr. Pierce added, clearly cutting the conversation short before anyone could make another comment about Dr. Whitly. Vic was eternally grateful for that, she really couldn’t take all the questions and betrayal and disappointment tonight. “Vic, Jennifer I’ll call you if there any updates, I promise but you need to sleep,” 

“Oh, okay,” Jennifer replied, sounding small 

“Take my keys to his place, I’ll stay with him tonight,” Vic saw how badly this was hurting Jennifer, and her big sister instincts really did take over, never mind that Jennifer was older than her. That didn’t matter because Jennifer was Lucas’ little sister, and she didn’t know how to do this without her big brother that had raised her since she was a kid, so Vic would step up like she always did. 

“Thank you, I don’t want to see him like that” Jennifer sounded as exhausted as Vic felt. She just wanted to go home and sleep in Lucas’ warm embrace, seeing as that was impossible, it was probably better not to sleep at all, she didn’t have restrains at the hospital (She did have restrains at Lucas’ place, she hoped Jennifer wouldn’t go into his room, they would be tricky to explain), she could hurt someone and that wasn’t a risk she was willing to take. 

“I’ll drive you to Luke's, you're in no shape to drive there yourself,” Sullivan said softly. “Hughes, you good?” 

“I’m fine, Captain,” It was clearly a lie, she was most definitely not fine, but she could definitely handle the situation. “Dr. Pierce, can I talk to you privately?” 

“Of course,” Pierce motioned for her to follow, and Vic did. She hoped by the time she returned to the attendings' lounge, her team would have cleared out and she wouldn’t have to explain. She had seen the looks of confusion and disgust when her father had been mentioned, she knew they were bound to think of her differently for just getting a consult from a serial killer. Vic couldn’t even imagine what their reaction would be when they found out her connection to him.

Vic knew that Andy could have figured it out by now, with all she heard from the phone call, it terrified Vic. The idea of losing her family and her home because of her father. 

“I’m sorry you had to talk to him,” Vic told Pierce as soon as they entered a room filled with plants, and the door shut behind them. “I didn’t doubt your medical capabilities, you’re amazing you saved my best friends life, it’s just—”

“It’s okay Vic, I know,” Pierce reassured her, she knew her medical ability was never in question. 

“Thank you for everything Dr. Pierce,” If Lucas survived, Vic was pretty sure their firstborn might have to be named Maggie, after all the doctor had saved Travis too. 

“Call me Maggie,” Pierce sat down on a chair and motioned for her to do the same, “What did you need to talk about?” 

“Please don’t tell anyone,”

“Tell people wh—” 

“I walked into that attendings’ lounge and you couldn’t look me in the eye, you focused on Jennifer, when they questioned why Dr. Whitly worked at Claremont you couldn’t find the words you just looked at me and now we’re in some sort of anxiety room and are looking at me with pity and wariness. That means you know who he is to me, so please I am asking you don’t tell anyone because the only other person in Seattle that knows is laying on a hospital bed with a tube down his throat,” Vic had always been good at reading people and their reactions when it came to Martin, and maybe she had picked up on some of Malcolm’s profiler skills. 

“Doctor-Patient confidentiality, don’t worry” Maggie responded very calmly. 

“HIPAA doesn’t really account for serial killer fathers,” 

“Still, I understand it’s private,” Maggie herself had had an experience with not wanting people to find out about her parents, even if the situation was vastly different. 

“I hate him,” Vic needed someone she could talk with, someone that knew, “Martin Whitly is the only person I truly hate in this world, he ruined my life, he broke me, he broke my entire family. But I love Lucas so much, I don’t want to lose him and if that means talking to my father, then I talk to my father. Still, I am sorry you got caught in the crossfire,” 

“Vic, I can handle a phone call with him for my patient, I’m a doctor it’s sort of in the requirements,” 

“I wanted to be a cardiothoracic surgeon when I was a kid, I wanted to be just like him, then I found out he was a serial killer, and I ran away from medicine as far as possible, hell, I went to college for musical theater.” 

“You’re a certified EMT firefighter now,”

“Yeah, let’s not look too closely at the psychology of that,” Her therapist had had a fit when she announced that she has signed up for the fire academy, something about risking her life as a way to atone for her father’s crimes. Vic thinks that bullshit, she went into firefighting because it’s her passion because it gets her excited because she gets to help people and prevent death, not everything in her life has to be traced back to her father, she is more than just his daughter. Still, no one had been more upset about her career path than her mom. 

_“I graduated this week,” Vic has flown to New York to celebrate graduating from the Fire Academy, her first shift on station 19 started on Monday._

_“Darling, is everything alright with your head? You graduated NYU years ago,” Jessica pointed out, with a mimosa in her hand. Victoria had arrived in New York yesterday night and had asked for a family brunch, sadly Malcolm was halfway across the country solving a case._

_“No, mom I graduated from the Fire Academy, I’m going to be a firefighter” Vic had not told her family, although she suspected Malcolm might know already, he always knew these sorts of things._

_“And you didn’t mention this because?” Angry was clear in her mother’s voice._

_“Because you would have gotten angry and tried to stop me like you’re doing right now” Vic matches her mother’s anger, it reminds her of when she was a teenager._

_“Of course I would have, this is a stupid idea and it’s going to get you killed,” Jessica’s voice was an octave higher than usual, and it made Vic pause._

_“Mother, in the state of Washington, between 1990 and 2018 there were only 40 on-duty firefighter fatalities,” Victoria was a Whitly, she came prepared and she wouldn’t back down._

_“Mhm I’m still not happy about this, what did your therapist say?” Jessica gets the weekly therapy bills from Victoria, she knows her daughter is going which is at least more than she can say for her son._

_“That’s none of your business, mom” Vic snapped back, her mother didn’t need to know that her therapist was also not keen on the idea of firefighting._

_“You and your brother are going to put me in an early grave, at least Ainsley chose a safe career,”_

_“And that’s one of the many reasons I’m your favorite child, right?” Ainsley chimed in as she came through the door and gave Vic a hug “What are we talking about? Because last time I checked musical theater isn’t exactly dangerous”_

_“Victoria has decided to become a firefighter,”_

_“Oh firefighting, how exciting, I’m definitely the favorite child after this, you and Malcolm make it so easy,” Ainsley joked, the only parent that had favorites was Martin, that man sure did love his prodigal son._

_“Malcolm is an FBI profiler, I am firefighter now, they are both professions every normal parent would be proud of,”_

_“Yes well, not every parent has a serial killer for an ex-husband, do they? I worry about the three of you constantly, it’s not easy, the amount of pills I take, it would make a regular person go bankrupt”_

_“Mom, I’ll be fine, I promise, this is a good thing, please be happy for me,”_

_“Fine,” Jessica was clearly not happy, but she knew Victoria deserved to do whatever she wanted, to be free of Martin, and if firefighting was what it took, then so be it._

“Sure,” Maggie smiled at her. “This room is supposed to reduce anxiety, so stay here as long as you need,” 

“Thanks,” Vic uttered, even though the doctor had already left the room. Vic did need peace and quiet right now, it was probably one of the last moments of tranquility she would get for a while. She had always known Victoria Hughes was a house of cards that would come crumbling down, she just didn’t think it would happen at her happiest.

There was another phone call she needed to make tonight. 

“Hi mom,” Vic sniffled into the phone. 

“Honey,” Jessica didn’t sound mad, it was more than what Vic expected 

“Are you mad at me?” Vic really wanted to hug her mom, in the span of a few hours, she had started to hate the distance between them. 

“Furious sweetheart, but it doesn't matter,” Jessica countered.

“It doesn’t?” Vic asked, Jessica thought she sounded exactly like she did as a kid. 

“I spoke to your brother, he told me why you called your dad, this Lucas, do you love him?” That had been one of the most shocking phone calls she had ever received, her eldest was getting married. 

“He’s the love of my life mom, I’ve never loved anyone like I’ve loved him,” Vic smiled just thinking of him. 

“Oh honey, I’m so proud of you, I definitely thought your sister would be the one to end up in a stable relationship,” Out of her three children, Ainsley was the one least affected by their father, the one that had required less therapy. 

“Yeah, me too honestly, this was all very surprising to me too,” If you had told Vic 24 hours ago that she would be engaged to Lucas Ripley and talking to her father, she would have laughed in your face. 

“Now, a very important question, how did he propose?” Proposals were important, and Vis deserved the best,

“He didn’t, I did,” 

“My little Victoria, a romantic, who knew,” 

“Well, it wasn't exactly what you would consider romance, I proposed after he ran out of a burning building, I just blurted it out while we stood next to an Aid Car,”

“That means you don’t have rings yet, this is exciting we can buy rings, planning your wedding is going to be so fun,” That was bound to be fun, and maybe end with someone dead knowing this family. 

“Mom, he might still die,” 

“Not if he’s fighting for a life with you,” Jessica knew her daughter was distraught, she knew the next couple of months were going to be hard. “He’ll be okay, and then I’ll get him to sign a prenup and your siblings will drive him insane,” 

“Thank you mom, I really needed this,” 

“Of course you did, I’m a terrific mother, and clearly you all do idiotic things without me, like calling your father instead of any other world-renowned cardiothoracic surgeon, I could have gotten Cristina Yang for you in less than 24 hours if had told me,” 

“Mom please, can you not,”

“Fine, but we will talk about this once your fiancé has recovered,” 

“I love you, mom.” 

“I love you too Victoria,” Jessica ended the call, before boarding the Jet to Seattle, there was no way in hell she was letting her daughter go through this alone, Malcolm and Ainsley would be fine without her for a couple of days.

Vic stayed in the green room for about thirty minutes before she decided to head back to the attendings’ lounge, she prayed her team had gone home already and she could answer their questions next shift. 

She was surprised to see that only Travis and Andy remained, it didn’t take a genius to figure out why. 

“Andy, can I speak with Travis before you and I have the conversation that has been coming since you overheard the call?” Vic said with her voice cracking. 

“Okay, I’ll be outside, don’t keep me waiting for too long,” Andy replied before stepping out of the room. 

“I stayed to see if you needed a change of clothes or anything, and because I know you wouldn’t want to be alone,” Travis knew she hated being alone, and when Micheal had died, he would have wanted her at his side. 

“I know, thank you Trav, you’re my best friend, you know that right? You’re one of the most important people in my life, I love you so much,” Vic loved Lucas, he was the love of her life, but there was no denying the fact that Travis Montgomery was her soulmate, her best friend.

“I love you too Vic, you’re my person,” Travis could sense something was wrong with her, and it wasn’t just the fact that her fiancé was in the hospital.

“I’m going to tell you something, and I need you to promise me you won't hate me,” Vic needed someone other than Lucas and Pierce to know, someone she had chosen to tell out of her own accord and not because of overheard phone calls, meddling serial killer fathers and nightmares. 

“I could never hate you,” Victoria Hughes could kill a man and she would still be perfect in Travis Montgomery’s eyes.

“Promise?” Her voice waivers and he couldn’t take it anymore, he moved in to hug her, Vic didn’t fight it. This could be the last time she ever hugged Travis like this, that he felt comfortable enough with her to do this, the last time he ever saw her as more than her father’s daughter.

“Pinky Promise,” He kissed the top of her head. Both bracing themselves for what she was going to say next. Travis didn't know what it was, but whatever she needed to tell him was important and he was going to support her no matter what. 

“Martin Whitly is my dad,” She whispered into his chest, her most prized secret, her most shameful truth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How do you think Travis will react?


	4. The Visit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Travis reacts to Victoria's secret.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Look at me, double update, I'm keeping yall well fed. The next chapter is probably coming next weekend

Vic knows the bomb she just dropped on him, she is perfectly aware of the gravity of the situation, of the implications. That’s why when Travis says nothing and his arms loosen around her, she moves back and out of his embrace. If their friendship is to survive this, she needs to let him take the lead. 

“Trav?” Vic tries to speak as softly and as not threatening as she can. “Talk to me please,”

“How? How am I supposed to talk to you? What’s the appropriate reaction supposed to be?” Travis sounds as lost as she feels. 

“I don’t know, maybe not hating me would be a good start,” Vic hates how small her voice sounds, how vulnerable she feels. “You’re kind of the only person I’ve told, I don’t know what I’m doing here,” 

“Ripley, the man you’re going to marry, doesn’t know your dad is a serial killer?” Travis asks, not without skepticism. 

“He knows, but I didn’t tell him, I had a night terror and had to explain it to him in the morning, you’re the first person I’ve told because I wanted to, not because of the circumstances,” She emphasizes, she needs Travis to know that he’s special. 

“You had a night terror? Does that happen often?” His voice softens, Vic thinks she might detect some concern. 

“It’s no big deal I’ve been having them since I was a kid, and honestly these days they mostly happen after a bad shift,” Vic says like it’s nothing, and Travis’ heart breaks for her, “Besides I have them under control, it’s not dangerous to anyone if I use the restrains, I promise.” 

“Vic,” Travis whispers, “Can I hug you?” 

Vic tilts her head in confusion, before nodding. She doesn’t really understand why Travis is asking for her permissionn to hug her, not when he’s the one that should be running for the hills, but she won’t complain. There are very few places where Vic feels at home, Travis’ arms happen to be one of them. 

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before, I just wanted to get away from him,” Vic tightens the hug, and Travis squeezed back. “He ruins everything and everyone, I just wanted someplace where I could be free,” 

“Oh Vic, I’m not angry,” Travis knows his best friend, he knows her, he knows she’s not like her father, he can clearly see how worried she is, how hard this is hitting her. “I’m confused and a little hurt, but I’m not angry at you, you’re still my best friend, you’re always going to be my best friend,” 

“Even if my dad brutally killed at least 23 women and left me with enough trauma that my therapist could retire early?” Vic was keen on making sure he knew what he was getting into. 

“Absolutely, Vic I love you, and my love for you is not defined by other people in your life,” Travis declares with an air of finality and she believes him. “We’re firefighters, how the hell do you afford a therapist?” 

“Uh, I might be rich,” Vic stammered. 

“Might be?” Travis mocked her. 

“Okay, my family is definitely very rich, mom comes from old money,” 

“Tell me about them, please?” 

“There’s my dad, obviously a horrible person, traumatized the hell out of the whole family, diagnosed narcissistic sociopath, so let's skip over the amazing experience that is having a serial killer father,” Sarcasm was clear in her voice. Still, Vic couldn’t stop herself, she had been keeping the most important people in her life separate, and it was about time she stopped, “Then there’s mom, her name is Jessica, I love her a lot, raising three kids wasn’t easy and she tries her best, even if some of her parenting techniques are questionable.” 

“Three kids?” Shock was clear in his face, he had never imagined Vic with siblings. 

“I’m the oldest, then my brother Malcolm, and then my sister Ainsley, I love them both so much even when they’re assholes. Malcolm is a consultant for the NYPD and Ainsley is a reporter,” Vic gently let go of Travis, took her phone out, and opened the photo album called labeled ‘the three stooges’, and showed Travis a picture of them as kids, Vic was 11, Malcolm was 9 and Ainsley was 4, all of them in matching swimsuits by a pool. “This is from when we were kids, that’s our summer house in the Hamptons, we were down there for a weekend and Malcolm wanted to see who could hold their breath underwater for longer I won obviously,” 

“Summer house in the Hamptons? Oh my god, you’re a New York socialite Gossip Girl style,” Travis was having so much fun teasing Vic. 

She hit his shoulder, playfully and he smiled at her, motioning for her to continue, she quickly swiped past the picture with their horses, which was too embarrassing, and went straight to the adult recreation of the picture she had shown him before. 

“This is us last year, same house in the Hamptons, mom wanted to go to Bali, but Ainsley and I couldn’t take so much time off work, and I still beat Malcolm on our breath holding competition,” 

“Your brother is hot,” He blurted out.

“Ew, Travis no stop,” Vic made a face of vague disgust. 

“What? You’re telling me you have super hot family members and don’t expect me to say anything?” He could tell she needed him to act as if everything were normal, like she was still just Vic Hughes. 

“Disturbing thoughts about my brother having sex aside, I would tell you to go for it, but according to Ainsley he’s got a thing for his coworker, some Detective Powell, even if he won’t admit it.”

“Sounds like you really love them,” He was happy he got the privilege of knowing about her family.

“I do, I might have hated being a Whitly so much I changed my name, but those three, I wouldn’t trade them for anything,” Vic had changed her name to get away from her father, but never her mom or her siblings. “When Lucas and I have our wedding, you’ll get to meet them because you’re going to be my Man of Honor and Ainsley will be a bridesmaid and Malcolm will walk me down the aisle, and mom will probably try to micromanage the whole thing. They will love you, Travis,” 

“I look forward to meeting them,” Hearing her say so easily that he was her Man of Honor made him want to tear up a little. 

“Thank you, Travis, for being okay with this, for not thinking I’m a monster or like my dad, for being my best friend, thank you,” Relief was palpable in her voice.

“Always Vic, getting rid of me is impossible, the skyscraper proved that,” He shot back.

“You better, this was your one chance to give up on me with no consequences, you’re doomed now,” Vic looked at him and gave him a watery smile. 

“Deal,” He smiled back at her. 

“I am so not looking forward to the whole team finding out,” Vic groaned.

“Do they have to?” He asked genuinely, he could understand why this wasn’t a thing she publicly advertised. 

“Andy knows, or at least I think she suspects, she overheard a phone I had with Malcolm after my panic attack about how dad was fucking me up but he could help Lucas so I had to talk to him, and if Andy knows and you know it won’t be a secret for long, besides—” 

“You had a panic attack?” he interrupted her ramble.

“Yeah that’s what a dying fiancé and talking to your serial killer father for the first time in ten years does to you I guess,” Vic replied in a nonchalant manner, dismissing one’s mental health issues was a Whitly family specialty. 

“I want to cover you in bubble wrap and never let you go,” Travis joked, but he meant it, Vic had gone through so much already, he didn’t want the world to hurt her anymore. 

“You and my mother both, get in line,” Vic took a deep breath and steeled herself for the conversation that was coming. “Stay with me, while I talk to Andy, I have a feeling she won't take it as well as you did,” 

Andy was still waiting by the door, looking through her phone. 

“You want him here for this conversation?” Andy asked because she knew the conversation was going to be personal, and she wasn’t sure Travis knew. 

“Yes, I just told him what I’m about to tell you anyway,” Vic was really grateful Travis had taken things so well, that he could be here for this part. 

“Okay,” Andy was trying so hard to give Vic a chance to explain, but her patience tonight was wearing thin. “Start talking,” 

“Come on Andy, don’t be so harsh on her, it’s been a hard day,” Travis interrupted. 

“I’m trying, but the sheer amount of lies and revelations that went down today, are making me doubt if I even know Vic,” Andy answered drily. 

“It’s okay Travis, I kind of deserve this, huh?” Vic tried to center herself before continuing. “I am assuming, you have figured out why and how I got a consult with Dr. Whitly,”

“I think so, please tell me it’s not true,” Andy had spent the entire time Vic talked to Travis researching The Surgeon, the things she had found made her insides churn, the idea of Vic being related to such a person was not something she wanted to consider. 

“I’m sorry Andy, I won’t lie to you anymore,” Vic reached for Travis’ hand. “Dr. Martin Whitly is my father, that’s a fact I’ve been trying to run away from ever since I moved to Seattle.” 

“Why? Why didn’t you tell us?” Andy demanded to know. 

“Everyone, always look at me differently after they find out, it’s either fear or pity, I’m either an accomplice or a victim, I wanted none of that from you,” tears formed in her eyes, Victoria was so sick of crying but she couldn’t seem to stop. “The station is my home, my safe haven, it’s the one place in the world where everything my father has done can’t touch me. You guys are my family, and I didn’t want you to hate me, I don’t think I could take that,” 

“So you changed your name and lied to us about being related to a serial killer?” Sarcasm dripping from Andy’s every word. 

“I changed my name when I moved to Seattle, because the weight of being a Whitly was crushing me and I wasn’t going to survive,” Vic’s voice was not steady. “Okay Andy, my own father was destroying me from the inside out, had I not left New York and Victoria Whitly behind, I would be as dead as the people Martin Whitly killed,”

“Vic,” Andy felt bad for springing this on Vic now, the poor girl was basically trembling. 

“I’m fucking sorry Andy and I don’t know how many times you want me to say it for it to be enough, or if it will never be enough and I’ll have to change shifts or transfer stations, but right now my fiancé is intubated and he might die and I just talked to my dad for the first time in 10 years, and truthfully I can’t take your anger or your disgust or your disappointment at the moment,” Vic exploded. 

“I don’t know what to say, I don’t even know what I’m feeling,” Andy maintained. 

“That’s okay, as long as you don’t hate me,” Vic really just wanted to keep her family. 

“Oh Vic, I’m pissed at you, but I could never hate you, you’re one of my best friends,” Andy said softly. 

“Thanks? I guess,” Vic spoke with her regular humor, trying to cover up the relief she felt that Andy didn’t hate her. 

“So your dad…” 

“Just ask whatever it is you want to ask,” Vic cut straight to the point. 

“How did you find out?” Andy followed Vic’s directions and just asked. 

“He tried to kill my brother and me when we were children,” Vic stated as if she were talking about the most normal thing in the world and not killing little kids. 

“What the fuck,” murmured Travis. 

“Oh my god,” Andy let out softly. 

“Well, actually there was the whole thing with the Girl In The Box and him drugging us with chloroform, that happened a couple of weeks before he tried to kill us, but I don’t think I truly got the reality of the situation until he was getting arrested and dragged out of the house in front of me,” 

“Chloroform?” Andy squeaked out. 

“It smells sweet from what I remember, which isn’t much, to be honest,” Vic tried to joke, it fell flat, her therapist had told her that joking about her trauma was not a healthy coping mechanism. “What, you didn’t think he hurt his own family? He’s a monster and we all got caught in the crossfire.” 

“Shit, that’s heavy,” Andy had no idea what she was supposed to say in this situation. 

Vic snorted, the story of her damn life. 

“We cool?” 

“Yeah, we are. I’m assuming you don’t want me to tell the others?” Andy questioned, relieved they were no longer talking about Vic almost getting murdered. 

“I’d appreciate it if you didn't, but I understand if you can’t, I’m just trying to figure how to tell them,” 

“Okay,” Andy replied before pulling her into a hug, this was Vic, everyone’s little sister, sweet, funny caring Vic, and she apparently had more baggage than Andy expected but it was still the same Vic. “I love you, I hope Ripley gets better, I’ll swing by tomorrow,” 

“Love you too,” Vic sniffled and watched Andy leave. 

“That went better than expected, maybe pity can be used in my favor sometimes,” 

“Your father tried to kill you,” Travis stated

“Mhm, yeah, technically he only planed it, but never actually when through with it, otherwise I’d be dead, he’s very good at killing people and he apologized for it, but that didn’t really make a difference,”

“Why didn't he…” Travis trailed off, not sure if Vic wanted to answer that question, he could see this was hard for her. 

“He was going to kill us with the help of his serial killer buddy Paul Lazar also known as John Watkins, took us up to a fishing trip, we weren’t supposed to come back,” Vic paused, the only person she had told about this was Lucas. “On the way, my brother and I bought a switchblade at a rest stop, because we thought the engravings were pretty, anyway, long story short, we stabbed Paul and in that moment my dad realized we were like him, and he didn’t kill us. Funny right? The only reason I’m alive is that I fucking stabbed someone when I was twelve,”

“I’m—” 

“Paul didn’t die, we didn’t commit murder as kids which is a cold comfort but still. He lived on to be a serial killer, he killed nineteen people, so maybe it would have been better if he had died, and then earlier this year, he kidnaped and tortured my brother before getting arrested, being a Whitly is so fun,” 

“You’re not your father, I don’t give a shit what you dad thinks, you did what you had to do to survive and Martin Whitly mistook that for evil, but you are not him, never will be,” Travis proclaimed, with no doubts in his mind that he was correct. 

“I really hope you’re right Travis, for everyone’s sake,” Vic proclaimed somberly. 

“Do you need me to bring you a change of clothes from your apartment?” Travis changed the subject, knowing Vic no longer wanted to talk about her father. 

“Please,” Vic uttered. “Walk with me to Lucas’ room,”

Upon arriving at Lucas’ room after a short but silent walk, Travis gave her one last quick hug, a kiss on the forehead, and left. Vic sat down on the chair next to his bed. 

“Hi, baby,” 

She started to cry. 

“I’ve had such a shit day, I wish you could hold me and tell me everything is going to be okay. I told Travis, I hope you’re proud of me, Andy found out too, but that was an accident and no doubt the rest of my station will find out soon, I hate that you won’t be here to support me through that,” 

She squeezed his hand. 

“My mother is already planning our wedding I suspect, she’s going to love you, I hope you won’t mind signing a prenup, you know I don’t care about that, but most of the times the path of least resistance is the best for mom,” 

Her thumb moved in circles against the back of his hand.

“Malcolm was happy for me of course, and I haven’t talked to Ainsley yet, but I’m sure someone told her already. I really need you to get better Luke.” 

The monitors beeped in the background. 

“Do you remember your birthday after you told me soft-serve ice cream was your favorite?” 

_“Toria, what is that?” He sounded amused._

_“It’s a soft-serve ice cream machine, duh” Vic playfully rolled her eyes at him._

_“Why is there a soft-serve ice cream machine in my house?” Those were words Lucas Ripley never thought he would say in his life, and not for the first time, he found himself thanking the universe for Victoria._

_“Because it’s your birthday, and soft serve is your favorite type of ice cream,” She replied like that was supposed to explain everything._

_“You rented a soft-serve ice cream machine for my birthday?” He asked with a stupidly beautiful smile on his face._

_“No, of course not, I bought it for you,” She smiled sheepishly._

_He threw his head back and laughed in a childlike carefree way that made her smile._

_“You amaze me constantly Victoria Hughes,” He told her honestly_

_“Do you like it?” Vic questioned because she knew it might have been a bit much._

_“I love it, but not as much as I love you,” He pulled her in for a kiss. “Still I have no idea how we’re going to clean that,”_

_“We’re firefighters I’m sure we’ll figure it out,” She kissed him this time._

_“I can see it on the news already, ‘Fire Chief of Seattle hospitalized for a freak accident while operating a soft-serve ice cream machine’ Frankel would never let me live that down,” Lucas said in a fake serious tone._

_“Don’t worry hubby, I’ll keep you safe from the dangers of soft-serve ice cream, I hear brain freeze is bad for old people,” She teased him, Vic didn’t usually tease him about their age difference, but it was his birthday so she figured it was allowed._

_“Old people huh? Could an old person do this?” Lucas said before grabbing her by the waist and hoisting her up like a sack of flour. Vic let out a mixture between a shriek and a laugh._

_Lucas threw her on the sofa, before giving her a hungry look._

_“Soft serve ice cream can wait, I can think of something better I’d like to eat,” He said before moving in to kiss her._

“You can’t die, I still don’t know how to clean that stupid soft serve ice cream machine,” She told him with a heavy heart. 

Travis came by with her change of clothes and a bag of essentials fifteen minutes later, he had offered to stay, but she had sent him home. 

Vic sat by Lucas’ bedside for hours, only leaving for coffee or bathroom breaks. Every single minute felt like an eternity of anguish and uncertainty while at the same time everything became a blur.

A resident whose name she didn’t know and a group of interns came by at some point and did their daily morning rounds. Vic was losing her sense of time, it tended to happen when she stayed awake for more than 48 hours, the world shifted out of focus and she became a ghost in it. 

“You look terrible, Victoria,” She heard from the doorway, “When was the last time you slept?” 

“Mom?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jessica is here, I wonder what kinds of trouble that will cause for Vic.
> 
> Who do you think will find out next?


	5. The Meeting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jessica's arrival causes some unforeseen problems for Vic.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tbh I don't really like how this turned out but I promised I would post a new chapter this weekend so I hope you enjoy it.

Vic can barely believe her eyes, she does a double-take and tries to make sure her mom is actually here, to make sure it’s not some sort of sleep deprivation hallucination—those haven’t happened to her before, but you never know in a family like hers. 

“Darling,” Jessica steps further into the room, “You didn’t think I’d let you go through this alone, did you?” 

“Mom,” Vic manages to choke out before finding herself firmly wrapped in her mother’s arms. Vic can’t seem to remember the last time she hugged her mom like this, probably not since she was a young teenager. They hug each other when Vic goes to visit New York—which is a rare occurrence—but they always do brief impersonal hugs. Right now she's clinging to her mother like she’s her last lifeline. 

“It’s okay Victoria, it’s going to be okay,” Jessica stops hugging Vic, puts her hands on her arms, and looks her in the eye. “Let’s get you something to eat, and then I’ll take you home so you can sleep,” 

“You’re going to drive?” 

“Goodness no, I brought Adolpho with me, he’s waiting in the rental car,” Jessica replies like it's the most obvious thing in the world. Vic thinks she should have seen this coming, it’s so typical of her mother.

“Of course you did,” She bursts out laughing at the ridiculousness of the situation, of course, her mother would fly across the country with her personal driver like he’s a necessity. “Where are you staying? Because Jennifer is at Lucas’ and I live in a one-bedroom apartment,” 

“I still don’t understand the need to live in such a small apartment, you could have the most luxurious penthouse in the city,” Jessica mutters, because truly how does her daughter live like that? When she has the Milton fortune at her disposal. 

“So I assume it’s a hotel,” Vic presses because she’s had this argument with her mother before, Jessica could never understand. 

“Nonsense, I bought a house in Seattle when you moved here years ago, it’s about time I use it,” Jessica explains. 

“You bought a house here? Ever since I moved? Why?” Vic questions, despite knowing it’s just her mother's protective borderline hovering behaviors. 

“I have one in DC from when Malcolm was living there, it’s just what mothers do,” Jessica dismisses her. Vic gives her a look to communicate the fact that she knows there’s more to the story and her mother huffs in return. “Fine, I bought the house because I was expecting you to end up in a hospital bed with a tube down your throat.” 

Victoria’s mood instantly sours after that, remembering she’s in her fiancé’s hospital room because he might be dying and her mother is here to make sure she doesn’t fall apart into a million pieces. 

“Mom, this is Lucas, Lucas this is mom,” She introduces them even if he’s not capable of participating in a conversation at the moment. “She’s here to make sure I don’t fall apart or go insane because the only reason you are alive is the ventilator Sweetheart,” 

“I would not put it like that,” Jessica protests. “Now, Lucas if you’ll excuse us, I need to make sure Victoria starts taking care of herself,” 

Vic gets no further warning before she's being dragged out of the room—truthfully she doesn’t put much of a fight—towards the hospital’s exit and to a nearby brunch restaurant. 

“Tell me, why date a man that is closer to my age than yours and who happens to be your boss,” Jessica tries to keep the judgment away from her voice, it’s not what Victoria needs right now, but she can’t quite manage. 

“Why marry a serial killer?” Vic snaps back, “Sorry, uncalled for.” 

“I see you still get bitchy when you’re stressed and sleep-deprived, not much different from when you were in college.” Jessica fires back, before backtracking “I’m sorry too, I didn't mean to judge, but darling I hardly know anything about your life, I see you maybe twice a year and now you suddenly have a fiancé, I swear sometimes you are worse than your brother.” 

Vic snorts “Yeah, my therapist says I need to work on my communication skills, but mom I love him, he’s the love of my life, no one has ever made me feel like this before,” 

Her mom seems to accept her answer or at least she says nothing else about the topic, instead, she goes on about the latest news and gossip of New York’s richest socialites and gently nudges Vic into eating a whole plate of Chicken and Waffles, all while persuading her not to drink any more coffee. One might say Jessica Whitly is a miracle worker. 

“You need to sleep, you’re practically falling asleep in front of me, not everyone can survive with the same amount of sleep as Malcolm,” Jessica declares as she pays for the check. 

“Let me go say goodbye to him, before we go home, just in case,” Vic knows this is a battle she won't win with her mother, not now and she is not afraid to admit that she is close to passing out from exhaustion. 

The hospital room looks the exact same way it did before she left. The monitors are still beeping. The ventilator noise is still filling the air. Lucas is still lying motionless, like a Disney princess waiting to be saved by a prince, except there’s no magical cure for him. The room itself is quite large, probably one of the nicest ones Grey-Sloan has to offer, he is the Fire Chief after all—even if he wasn’t, Vic knew she would have gotten it for him. 

The room smells like antiseptic and hospital, it makes Vic nauseous and she has to fight back the urge to run to the bathroom and puke her breakfast. She had never understood what Travis meant when he said that ever since Michael had died, hospitals made him sick to his stomach, until now when all she wanted to do was run away as fast as she could. 

Jessica had gone into the bathroom to freshen up after the flight and breakfast, leaving Vic all alone in the room with Lucas. 

“I’m glad mom’s here,” Vic moves to sit down and hold his hand again. The warmth of his skin is her only comfort. “She can be pushy but honestly it’s exactly what I need right now. You two are going to get along well I hope, or at least tolerate each other because I love you both so much.” 

She gently strokes his hair. 

“I am really nervous about how you’ll get along with my family, you know us Whitlys are a complicated bunch. Ainsley and Malcolm will probably be a bit harsh and protective at first, but I know they’ll warm up to you once you see how happy you make me. Mom is going to be tricky, she’s excited for us definitely and she's ready to plan the wedding but you can’t blame her for being wary. I’m really worried about Dad, I promised him if he managed to help fix you we’d go to New York for a visit and I understand if that’s too much for you.” 

_“So you have a brother, what’s he like?” Lucas dared to breach the topic, it had been a few weeks since the first-night terror and they had kept coming back, so much that they had developed a way to cuddle—albeit awkwardly— with the restraints firmly placed on her wrists._

_“He’s the best,” Vic said as she formed another gnocchi, they had been trying to cut on the amount of takeout they ate. “He’s a consultant with the NYPD, used to work for the FBI except they fired him which is stupid but whatever at least mom is happy that he’s back in New York. She worries a lot about us, especially me and Malcolm because we have dangerous jobs.”_

_Lucas has the feeling she loves talking about her family and there’s no one she can talk to, so he simply continues cooking gnocchi and lets her speak._

_“He’s a really good person and he can be so funny and also super frustrating sometimes, when we were little he used to have snakes, and he’d let them roam around the house, much to our mother's dismay,” Vic pauses to take a sip of her wine. “Ainsley and I used to say that he’s what happens when you severely caffeinate a puppy,”_

_“Ainsley?” Lucas wonders out loud. He hadn’t googled her family out of respect for her privacy._

_“Oh right I haven’t told you about Ainsley,” Vic gushed, “She’s my little sister, so there are three kids in total, I’m the oldest, she’s the only one of us that hasn't changed their name, she’s a reporter, I adore her when we were little and she took riding lessons, Malcolm and I used to fall asleep on top of the horses,”_

_“You took naps on laying on the horses?”_

_“Well Malcolm and I already knew how to ride at that point we just weren't interested in it like Ainsley, so we’d nap, horses are actually comfortable,”_

_“You’re full of surprises aren’t you Victoria Hughes?”_

_“Because I used to nap on top of the horses?” She teases him while leaning in for a kiss._

_“A combination of things,” Lucas replies with fake seriousness “I find it endlessly endearing,”_

_“Mhm I sure hope so,” Vic says lightheartedly. “I really need to go visit New York soon, because I haven’t seen my family in ages,”_

_“Do you miss New York?” Lucas asks while he wraps her in a hug from behind and rests his head on her shoulder._

_“Yes and no, I have a complicated relationship with the city,” She really does miss some things, like her favorite bagel shop, but she also knows New York was not good for her. “I definitely miss my apartment, god it was perfect, overlooking Central Park, the view was breathtaking, I loved waking up in the winter and seeing the snow cover the city.”_

_“Central Park? You had an apartment overlooking Central Park?” The shock is clear in his voice._

_“Technically I still have it, I would never sell that apartment it’s like my baby, I stay there when I go to New York,”_

_“Eggy, how the fuck do you afford an apartment like that?” He splutters because her Seattle apartment is a regular apartment that one could afford on a firefighters salary, which is a big difference from an apartment that overlooks Central Park and probably costs millions of dollars._

_“My inheritance and well my shares in the family foundation,” She replies, Vic has more money than she could spend in three live times, even if she gives generous amounts to charity every month. “When we can finally take our vacation I’ll take you to New York and you can meet my family and I’ll show you the library at my apartment, I think there’s a couple of first edition books you might be interested in,”_

_“Next you’re going to say you own a private jet,” He jokes and she gives him a sheepish look._

_“Okay it’s the family jet and I don’t use it because I’m a responsible firefighter that cares about her carbon footprint,” Vis argues back at him._

_“Well, you know what they say about eating the rich,” He whispers in her ear. Clearly, the gnocchis will not get done anytime soon, this is why they usually ordered takeout._

“You did WHAT?” Her mother screeches from the bathroom, apparently and much to Vic’s dismay hospital rooms are incredibly thin. 

“Mom, please can you not,” Vic groans.

“Not what? Have a very much needed conversation with you about your father?” 

“Not while, I am holding my dying fiancé's hand,” 

“How dramatic, he is not dying,” 

“Mom,” Vic snaps at her. Of course, this is conveniently the moment Vic’s team decides to drop by, maybe if Vic hadn’t been so sleep-deprived she would have remembered that Andy and Travis had promised to stop by in the morning and it is now technically the morning. “Hi, guys,” 

“Vic, we were just checking up on you,” Travis starts somewhat awkwardly. 

“Yeah we thought we might have to drag you home and get you something to eat,” Andy follows up, both of them are clearly concerned about what happened yesterday. Vic can see clear as day the wary look in their eyes when they look at her, but she doesn’t see fear which means they're just getting used to the idea of her having Martin Whitly for a father and she can live with that. 

“How’s he doing?” Ben speaks softly. 

“They said things look the same, which is a good thing because there’s no further damage,” Vic recalls what she heard during the morning rounds. 

“Hughes, go home, I’ll stay with Luke,” Sullivan tells her in a softer tone than usual. “You’re already on family leave until the end of the week,” 

“Thank you, captain,” Vic answers “And I was just heading home, I think,”

“You think?” Jack asks, amused.

“She will, no matter what she thinks,” Jessica answers for her as she leaves the bathroom. “Adolpho is still waiting in the car,” 

“My apartment is five blocks away, you don’t need to drive me,” 

“You think I’m taking you to your apartment? No, you are coming home with me,” Jessica exclaimed. 

“Are you kidding me? I’m an adult, mom,” Vic whines 

“Mom?” Dean asks in a high pitched voice, he had briefly met Mrs. Hughes one time when they had gone to pick up some food, this was most definitely not Mrs. Hughes. 

“How rude of me not to introduce myself,” Jessica chimed in, “I’m her mother, Jessica Whitly,”

“I’m adopted” Vic rushes to explain and she has to resist the urge to facepalm, the cat is most definitely out of the bag now. 

“Well that’s obvious darling your father only got away with the things he did for so long because he’s a white man,” Jessica countered. “Doesn’t mean I love you any less than your siblings,” 

“I know that mom,” Vic replies, Jessica (and Martin) had spent her entire childhood making sure she knew they loved her just like they loved Malcolm and Ainsley, Vic liked to joke that they loved her more because they chose her. “This is my crew, I’ve told you about them, Travis, Andy, Dean, Maya, Ben, Jack, Sullivan. Team this is my mom Jessica—”

“Whitly?” Maya interrupts, clearly angry. 

“Okay, let’s calm down and take a breather,” Andy puts her hand over Maya’s arm and shoots Vic an apologetic look. 

“They don’t know?” Jessica directs her question at Vic. 

“Most of them don’t,” Vic sighs. 

“Right, I’ll give you some space,” Jessica said apologetically before stepping out of the room. 

“Most? Which one of us do know?” Dean is clearly irked. 

“Travis and Andy—” 

“I understand Travis, but why Andy?” Jack doesn’t sound angry, he just sounds confused, Hughes really couldn’t keep a secret, he had known about Ripley since the start, it amazes him that no one else had known, they weren’t discreet. 

“We both literally found out last night, you all need to fucking tone it down” Travis cuts in, clearly being protective of Vic. “This is not the time or the place,” 

“What is the time or the place to find out your friend and coworker had been lying for years, Travis?” Maya fired back, “That her father is a fucking ruthless serial killer? When?” 

“Not when you’re in her fiancé’s hospital room,” Andy replied, and it seemed to have shut up Maya. Andy had seen Vic break down yesterday, she had researched Martin Whitly, only to find out he had tried to kill his own kids. 

“We are a team built on trust and they have been lying to us. That’s what you said when you found out about Andy and Jack,” Dean threw her words back at her, “I’m going to say the exact same thing I say back then. You know if we can’t trust each other this whole place falls apart.” 

“That’s enough,” Sullivan’s voice cut through the tension, “All of you, go home now and we will discuss this as a team when we’re not in the hospital. I’m I clear?” 

“Yes sir,” Vic’s team mumbles before leaving the room while murmuring amongst themselves, only Sullivan, Andy, and Travis are left behind. 

“Can you two explain things a little? Just to make sure I don’t need to transfer?” Vic’s joke sort of falls flat, but Travis and Andy nod before leaving. “Captain, you haven’t said anything about my father, does—” 

“Let’s just say I know a thing or two about having despicable family members,” Sullivan reassures her. “Now go home and sleep, Luke would kill me I didn’t make sure you take care of yourself,” 

Vic steps out of the room and into an almost fully empty hallway. This was not how her day was supposed to go, her team was not supposed to find out. Not like this, she had barely gotten in a word, she couldn’t explain. Sullivan basically had to tell them all to drop it and stop bothering her. Vic knew this was going to be another issue she would have to deal with on top of an already shitty situation, but at least she didn’t have to see her team until next week when she went back to work. She hoped Andy and Travis could do enough damage control. 

“You okay?” Her mom’s voice breaks her train of thought. 

“Let's just go home,” Vic doesn’t even fight to go to her apartment.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The central park apartment was completely self-indulgent, and I figured if Vic's already rich I might as well give her my dream home hehe. 
> 
> I promise the next chapter will include Ripley being conscious and not just in a flashback.


	6. The Discussion

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The team talks about Vic's father.

“You all need to cut Vic some slack,” Travis tells the team as they leave Ripley’s hospital room, anger clear in his voice. “I get it okay? This thing with her father being Martin fucking Whitly, the thing with Ripley, it hurts that she didn’t tell us, but right now that doesn’t matter because she’s going through a hard time and she's still our friend,”

“How are we supposed to do that? How am I supposed to see her as our Vic when she’s been lying to us this whole time?” Maya sounds hurt, clearly, she sees this whole situation as a betrayal of trust. “What else is she lying about? Her father is a literal serial killer, how does our trust come back from that? 

“Because she’s terrified Maya,” Travis replied softly, “Vic is absolutely terrified,” 

“Of what? How would we react?” Ben cuts Travis off, he’s been keeping pretty quiet trying to process the whole thing, it’s a shock, and not even in his years at Grey-Sloan has he ever needed to deal with a situation like this one. 

“Yes, but...” Travis debates on how much to share with the team, Vic had told him and Andy to do damage control, so he figures he has permission to share some of the things they discussed last night. “She terrified of herself,” 

“Scared of herself?” Jack sounds skeptical. 

“I don’t know the whole story or any details but I could tell last night that she’s scared of being like her father,” Travis sighs. 

“He tried to kill her,” Andy chimes in. “Vic’s own dad tried to kill her when she was a kid. I can understand why she tries to put as much distance between herself and him.”

“He tried to kill her?” Dean exclaimed, he might not be very happy with Vic at the moment, but she’s still family. 

“Yeah, and she brushed it off like it was nothing, along with other shit he did to her,” Travis had never really paid attention to true crime culture before, he had vaguely heard of Martin Whitly, and while he was definitely a terrible man for killing 23 people, the thing Travis hated him for was all the hurt he had inflicted on Vic.

“She had a panic attack in my arms last night because she had to talk to the father for the first time in a decade,” Andy revealed, “Trust me I was pissed too, but her fiancé is in the hospital, he might die, and she’s got enough shit going on right now, she doesn’t need crap from us too.” 

“It just doesn’t sit right with me,” Maya pressed on, clearly not understanding how Andy of all people was being calm about this. “You weren’t this calm when you found out about Gibson and me, and that was just us hooking up,” 

“God, you were hooking up with my ex Maya, not going through traumatic events,” Andy snapped back, not completely over the Gibson situation. 

“Andy, she asked us to do damage control, not make things worse,” Travis interceded. “No one is saying your feelings around the whole situation aren’t valid, okay? You get to feel whatever you’re feeling, I’m just saying that when Vic comes back to work don’t be assholes,” 

Travis can practically hear their hesitation in their silence. “Can you or can you not be mature adults that aren’t cunts towards their coworker and friend?”

“I won’t say anything,” Ben knew Vic, she’s his friend, they went through the blue fire together, she hadn’t been willing to leave their patient to save her own life, he knows what kind of person she is. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go say hello to Miranda,” 

“Hughie and I are cool,” Jack follows suit. Vic had helped him with his PTSD, she had told him she had it too, from the blue fire. Now knowing about her father and about how he had tried to kill her, Jack wonders if she didn’t have it before that. “Dean, come on none of us knew about your parents either, or the houseboat, it isn’t that different,” 

“My parents were trying to rope me into the family business—” 

“So did hers,” Travis snorts, the ridiculousness of the situation settling in “Except her dad deals in murder, not money,” 

Dean gapes at him a little, before regaining his composure. “Fine, I see your point, but I’m still not happy about this,” 

“None of us is,” Andy replies, she might be supporting Vic but that did not mean she wasn’t hating every single second of the situation. “Maya?” 

“I don’t know, and frankly I’m a little freaked out that you’re all okay with this” Maya snaps back. 

“Fear or pity,” Andy whispers softly. “That’s what Vic said, that when people find out they look at her with fear or pity. You’re scared of her Maya.” 

“She’s not her father,” Travis argues, he had honestly thought the team would be upset about the lies, not think that Vic was like her father. Travis is starting to see why Vic doesn’t tell people, it’s exhausting and they’re going in circles. “People aren’t their parents,” 

“I’m just saying, my dad is a big part of who I am, and if Vic’s dad is too, then we should be worried,” 

“She’s Vic, she saved a baby from a snake, she saved your ass at the skyscraper, she saved Travis’ ass at the skyscraper,” Jack spat out. “She’s still our Vic, The Surgeon has always been her dad, why would us knowing change things?” 

“Come on Maya, you’re not actually scared of her,” Dean might be a little iffy about the situation, but never in a million years would he be scared of Vic or think she’s capable of being a monster. 

Maya just stays silent and walks away. 

“That went well 10/10 damage control we did,” Travis huffs 

“Hey, we got three out of four, I’d say that’s not too bad,” Andy nudges him gently, she knows Travis would rather be there for Vic right now. 

“She’s going to be okay right?” Dean asks worry clear in his voice. 

“This is Vic we’re talking about, of course, she’s going to be okay,” Travis answers, trying to clear all the doubt from his voice, it doesn’t really work. 

“What happens now?” Jack wondered. 

“We go home, we rest from yesterday’s overtime, then we go back to work, pretend everything is okay,” Andy’s voice was stern, it made all of them remember why she had almost gotten the Captain's position. “Nothing else we can do,” 

**anything i can do to help?**

Travis texts Vic, just because her mother flew to Seattle to take care of her, doesn't mean he won’t be there for his best friend.

**does the team hate me?**

Vic decides to ignore Travis’ question, she can handle herself, and right now the only thing she might be able to do something about is her team’s reaction. 

**andy and i managed to calm things down, they’ll play nice next shift**

She can tell from his reply that there’s something he’s not telling her, which means damage control hadn't gone the way she’d hoped. 

**that’s not a no**

Vic texts him back dryly. 

**maya is being stubborn, she’ll come around don’t worry about it**

That probably means Vic is going to have a hard time getting Maya to trust her or even like her again. There’s a small part of Vic—big part, she’s trying to squash it down—that fears her relationship with her team is broken beyond repair. She’s always been scared of this, that her father’s legacy would find its way to Seattle and destroy everything she’s built for herself. 

Maybe, it’s what she deserves, for what she did— _almost_ did, the distinction is important—in high school. Vic hates thinking about Remington Academy, she hates how it made her feel, she hates what it almost made her do. It’s part of the reason she left New York, part of the reason she needed to get away from Malcolm and their dad, from the whole family really. No one knows what happened in Remington academy, it’s the one secret she has managed to keep from everyone in her life. 

“We’re here,” Her mother’s voice breaks through the haze of sleep-deprived thoughts. By her best estimate, the drive had taken around ten minutes, which clearly means her mom chose a house near the station and subsequently Grey-Sloan.

The house itself is clearly an older house that has been remodeled, she’d say early 20th century. It looks big, expensive, and yet classy exactly what one would expect from Jessica Whitly. Vic has probably driven past this house before having no knowledge that her mom has owned it for as long as she has been living in Seattle. 

“It’s no New York Milton house, but it will do,” 

“So no murders have occurred here?” Vic teases as she gets out of the car. 

“Not yet dear, please do not tempt me,” Jessica replies, no one to let a jab like that slide. “It’s a lovely house, it has a pool in the back, I'm sure you’ll enjoy it” 

“I haven’t swum since high school,” 

“You were on the Remington Swim team Victoria,” Jessica states as if Vic didn’t remember all the hours spent practicing and going to meets. As if the Remington pool isn’t a place that is forever burnt into her brain, no matter how hard she tries to forget. “Anyhow, the master bedroom is mine, your room is the only other room with a full bathroom,” 

“What about my things?” Vic needs certain things; pajamas, phone charger, bed restraints, clothes, mouth guard, hair products, skin-care routine products. She can’t just sleep anywhere. 

“Please you think I don’t already have the house ready for when you indubitably have to stay in it?” Don’t underestimate me,” Jessica responded. 

“Sure, that seems like a normal thing mom,” Vic’s reply is sarcastic, but she’s incredibly grateful for her mom’s tendency to overdo things, she really was not in the mood to head back to her apartment or Lucas’ house to get her things. 

“We are not exactly a normal family,” Jessica argues as they go into the house. “God knows normal families don’t put restraints on the beds,” 

“Aw, you remembered,” Vic deadpans. 

“As if I could forget two of my children sleep chained to the bed,” Jessica replies just as dryly 

“At least you have Ainsley,” Vic sing-songs, she knows that out of the three Whitly children, Ainsley had relatively been the one least affected by their father. Not that any of them had gotten away unharmed. 

“Just go to sleep Victoria,” Jessica sighs, sometimes she feels as if her children are still children acting stubborn and throwing tantrums.

For the dramatic effect of it all, Vic huffs and puffs up the stairs like a child getting grounded, her room isn’t hard to find, and just as promised, all of the things she needs to get ready are present. The room feels completely impersonal, there are no photographs, no trinkets, it could absolutely pass as a hotel room. On some level, it brings comfort to her, that this is only temporary and (hopefully) soon she’ll be back home in Lucas’ arms. 

After they get married, they should probably move in together, which means either finding a new place to live or moving into Lucas’ place because it was bigger. If Vic is being honest with herself, after this whole mess, she deserves to treat herself to a nice place to live, at least nicer than her current apartment. 

She takes a quick shower—Vic had showered before going to the diner, but that felt like ages ago. 

Vic forgoes the pajama set that lays on her bed in favor of some surely overpriced grey sweatpants and a cropped hoodie, she’s just about ready to pull the blackout curtains down when her phone rings. She doesn't recognize the number—it could be the hospital—she picks up anyway. 

“Victoria Hughes speaking,” 

“Hughes? You went back to Hughes? At least your brother picked something more original,” Martin Whitly’s voice comes through the phone, her heart starts racing. 

“How the fuck are you calling me?”

“They gave me phone privileges months ago, isn’t it great?” his voice sounds so cheerful, it makes her want to strangle him. Of course, he had gotten phone privileges. “I had been trying to get your number for a while but neither your siblings nor your mother would budge,” 

“Great, so on top of everything I get to be endlessly harassed by a serial killer,” 

“Be nice Victoria I’m still your father,” 

“Some father you are, trying to kill me when I was a kid,”

“I have apologized for that, I really do deeply regret entertaining the idea of killing you are your brother,” 

“No, you apologized to Malcolm, not to me, there’s a difference”

“You weren’t talking to me at the time,” Martin argues with her, his tone still one of a loving father, it makes her skin crawl. “For what it’s worth I am sorry Victoria,” 

“I regret talking to you now,” 

“How long has it been since you slept? You get bitchy when you’re stressed and tired, reminds me of your highschool years,”

“Funny, mom said the same thing earlier,” 

“Ah, you’re mother is an extraordinary woman,” 

“What do you want dad?”

“To talk with my daughter, to reconnect, it’s been a decade Victoria, I missed you,” 

“Best decade of my life,” Vic sighs, she’s really not in the fucking mood to deal with her father’s simpathy and manipulations. “Listen, I haven't slept in who knows how long, my fiancé might die, so I’m going to hang up now,”

“I’ll call you later, love you,” 

Vic has never ended a call faster. Since when does her father say ‘I love you’ to any of his children? Honestly, she doesn’t think she can remember if he ever said it before, not to her, at least not since she was a child. It breaks her heart that she doesn’t know if her father actually loves her or if it’s all just an act. It infuriates her that she even cares. Enrages her that she can’t deny that she does love him, no matter how much she tries not to, no matter how much she hates him. 

True to her word, her mother had professional restraints added to the bed, it’s the high-quality leather and soft on the inside of the cuffs. On the nightstand, there is a case with a mouth guard, she’s been grinding her teeth since she was a kid. 

Hours later Vic wakes up feeling slightly better and yet not fully rested, which means she definitely had a night terror. She’s eternally glad that most of the time unless they’re truly bad, she doesn’t remember them or remember having them. She’s just left feeling the after-effects, which is by no means pleasant. 

According to her phone, it’s 5:20 pm. 

It gives her enough time to order a pizza—her favorite pizza place is actually closer to her mom’s house than her apartment, and Vic has never been more grateful—, call Jennifer and go visit Lucas at the hospital for a few hours. 

“MOM,” Vic yells to make sure her mother can hear, wherever she may be around the house. “As soon as the pizza gets here, I’m going back to the hospital,” 

Her pizza takes less than fifteen minutes to arrive, her mother is clearly appalled by her choice of food but she says nothing. In those fifteen minutes, Vic changes the cropped hoodie for a sports bra and a loose burgundy shirt, the hospital doesn’t require a high fashion outfit. 

Her mother insists that instead of an Uber she let Adolpho take her to the hospital, Vic figured it’s for the better, then she can just swing home from the hospital and get her jeep. 

Sullivan is still in the hospital room when she gets here. 

“Pizza?” Vic greets him and shakes the box containing a half-eaten pizza pie. 

“Hughes, you’re back,” 

“My mother might have forced me to get some sleep, but I needed to come back,” Vic replies honestly, his reply from early about having despicable family members too is still stuck in her brain, but she doesn’t want to be rude and ask directly “Have you eaten Sir? Because this pizza is truly good,” 

“I haven’t,” Sullivan says as he reaches for a slice. “I think you can call me Sullivan or Sully at this point,” 

“Okay, Sullivan,” Vic makes a grimace, it’s strange calling him Sullivan, she can’t even imagine what calling him Sully would feel like. “Did the doctors say anything?” 

“He’s getting better, Dr. Pierce thinks she could probably take him off the ventilator in about a week and probably do the balloon valvuloplasty in two week’s time, but she has no idea how long it will take for him to recover enough for the aortic valve replacement,” 

“That’s good,” Vic’s relief palpable in her voice, she knows things are still delicate and there's still a chance he won't make it, but it’s something. “I needed the good news,” 

“How are you? Besides Lucas being in the hospital,” Sullivan asks, Hughes is part of his team and he takes care of his team. 

“I’m pretty sure Bishop hates me, I don’t know how Warren, Miller, or Gibson feel about this, my mother is in Seattle and I don’t know for how long it’s going to be nice instead of annoying,” Vic rambles, she desperately needed someone to talk to, someone that could be objective, she loves Travis but he worries too much. “Oh, and my serial killer father now has my phone number,” 

As if she had summed him, her phone rings, and the words Claremont Psychiatric Hospital flash across her screen. Vic shows the phone to Sullivan as proof before silencing it and letting the call go to voicemail, hopefully, her father will think she’s still asleep and not call her again until tomorrow. 

“I’ll handle the team, make sure they behave,” Sullivan treasures her, strangely enough, Vic believes him. “Luke’s going to be fine, he has to be,” 

“Thanks,” 

They talk for hours, telling each other different stories about Lucas, it feels nice. Visitation hours end and a nurse basically kicks them out. 

“Hughes, if you need more time off work, let me know, I’ll arrange it,” 

“I’m fine,” 

“Are you really?” 

“Correction, I’ll be fine, don’t worry about me,”

“I’m your captain, it’s kind of my job to worry about you,” 

“I appreciate that, but seriously if I don’t go back to work next week I might go insane,” Vic hopes her voice doesn’t betray just how much the job means to her, how much it ground her, how much she seriously won’t last more than a week living with her mom and having nothing to do. 

That week between Lucas falling ill and going back to work is one of the hardest of her life. She spends most of it in Lucas’ hospital room, only leaving when visiting hours are over or when her mother or Travis force her to go out to eat. 

“He’s ready to be taken off the ventilator,” Maggie tells Vic the morning of the day before she goes back to work. 

“He is?” Vic’s voice is full of hope. 

“His lungs are doing much better, we caught the acid in time, so it’s safe to take him off the ventilator,” Maggie places her hand on Vic’s arm for reassures, “I’m still keeping him on supplementary oxygen, and he won’t be able to leave until at least a week after his balloon valvuloplasty, but yes he’s doing incredibly well.” 

For the first time in a long time, Victoria Hughes cried tears of happiness, of relief. 

Taking him off the ventilator doesn’t take long, Maggie takes the tube out in less than a minute. 

“Sedation should wear off in a couple of hours, he’ll probably be groggy and confused,” Maggie tells her softly before leaving the room. 

Vic sits by his bedside holding his hand for 3 hours and 46 minutes before his eyes flutter open. 

“Hey, you’re okay, you’re in the hospital,” She jumps to reassure him, never letting go of his hand. 

“Eggy, hi,” Lucas’ voice sounds rough from having a tube down his throat for a week. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This took so much longer to write than planned I'm sorry. 
> 
> Hey, at least Lucas is awake now, which means loads of Vicley content next chapter. 
> 
> I didn't bother to research much of the medicine this chapter (unlike the others) because I needed Ripley to wake up on a certain time frame but who cares.
> 
> I know Maya is kind of acting like a bitch, but that's just because she has to deal with her own issues with her father, don't worry she'll come around. Plus I'm excited for the "We have shit fathers" club she and Vic will make when Maya working through her own stuff.


	7. The Awakening

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lucas is awake, he and Vic talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry, this took a while longer than I planned, but that's because I have a beta now yay. Thank you to my friend LL for being my beta.

“Lucas,” Vic exhales with pure unfiltered relief and happiness. “Welcome back to the land of the living hubby.”

“Vic,” he says with a sore throat and with love, “Kiss me.” 

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Vic admits. 

“You could never hurt me,” Lucas squeezes her hand, “Eggy, Vic, kiss me.” 

She leans in to kiss him, it’s a gentle kiss, he has been unconscious and sedated for a week, but it might be the best kiss Victoria Hughes has ever had. It tastes like a flower, like winning. It tastes like home. 

“I’ve missed you so much,” Vic sniffles, gently leaning her forehead against his, it’s an awkward position, but she couldn’t care less. Her home is back. “It’s been one hell of a week, baby.” 

“I’ve been out for a week?” Lucas remembers flashes of conversation here and there, he thinks he remembers Sullivan coming to visit him, still, everything is fuzzy in his mind. “Are you okay?” 

“You just woke up after being extubated for a week because you have aortic stenosis and hydrofluoric acid poisoning which almost lead to your death, and you’re asking me if I’m okay?” Vic asks with disbelief. 

“If it had been you in the hospital, I wouldn’t be okay,” Lucas whispers, it’s his turn to rub her hand with his thumb for comfort. 

“Dr. Pierce and my dad agree, you need to have a balloon valvuloplasty in about a week to fix your heart temporarily, and then in a couple of months when you’ve fully recovered Maggie can do an aortic valve replacement,” Vic dodges his question, going straight into the clinical information. Lucas sighs, he can tell it’s been a hard week on her, there are dark circles under her eyes, her shoulders are as tight as a bowstring with tension, and she’s been biting her fingernails. Lucas knows her too damn well and he hates himself a little bit for being the cause of her anguish. “I would like to be married by the time you have heart surgery, I don’t want you to die without having married me.” 

“Toria,” Lucas tries to comfort her, “I’ll marry you as soon as I can leave the hospital and put on a suit.” 

She flashes him a smile so bright he thinks the sun couldn’t possibly compare. 

“Good, I think it might drive my mother insane if we don’t get married soon and she doesn’t get to splurge on the wedding,” Vic jokes. She's absolutely grateful that her mother came to Seattle to help her, but it’s also testing the boundaries of her sanity. 

“Your mother?” Lucas tries to keep the nerves out of his voice, he’s not sure how well that works out for him. He has never met Vic’s family—other than her team at the station, that’s different because he is their boss—and frankly, the idea of meeting her family scares him a little bit, not because of the Whitly thing, but because from what he’s heard, they are a tight-knit family. He doesn’t want them to hate him. 

“Oh yeah, I told you while you were sedated but I guess you wouldn’t remember it,” Vic tilts her head in that cute way that drives him insane. “She flew out here after you got intubated, apparently she owns a house in Seattle. I’ve been forced to stay there because according to her I’m acting too much like my brother and not taking care of myself, she’s been driving me crazy,” 

“You haven’t been taking care of yourself?” Lucas asks sharply. 

“That is a gross exaggeration on everyone's part, I just hadn’t slept a lot when she got here and you know Jessica Whitly’s favorite thing to do is worry about her children,” Vic brushes his concern off. It had been a very difficult week, but he didn’t need to worry about her right now. 

“Being engaged to one of her children, I can see why,” Lucas fires back. Vic has missed their banter so much over the past week, it makes her want to tear up. 

“Traitor, don’t side with her,” Vic gently swats at his leg with her free hand. 

“Nope, I’m on the side of whoever is making sure you’re taking care of yourself,” Lucas makes sure to pop the P in nope, to get his point across. 

“Hubby, I’m fine, I’ve had worse, as long as I’m not having a mental breakdown strong enough to buy another private island in the Bahamas, I’m not worried,” Vic knows she’ll be dealing the effects of the past week for a long time, but she can handle it, especially now that Lucas is awake. 

“ _Another_ private island in the Bahamas?” Lucas’ face shows pure stupefaction, only the filthy rich have private islands, he still has no idea how rich Victoria actually is, not that it makes any difference to him. 

“I was drunk, stressed and in college, it made sense at the time,” Vic says in her own defense, Malcolm and Ainsley had mocked her enough for that drunken decision, their mom has just critiqued her island of choice. Vic has stayed far away from coffee-flavored vodka ever since. 

“So you bought a private island in the Bahamas?”

“Mhm, it’s gorgeous, most of the time I rent it, but we could go on our honeymoon there if you want,” Vic answers nonchalantly. “It’s called Big Fish Cay.”

“Sure Eggy, I’d like that,” Lucas replies through heaps of laughter. Victoria Hughes is a mystery that he’ll spend the rest of his life trying to solve if she lets him. “I miss you too, thank you for saving my life.” 

“Yeah, well, you were being an idiot.” 

“Was not,” Lucas protests 

“You didn’t get checked out when you were coughing at the scene, and you wanted to leave the hospital and then you had a DNI,” Vic replies in exhaustion, “Honey I love you but you were being an idiot.” 

“Okay, you have a point. I was being an idiot.” 

“Promise me you won't do it again,” Vic pleads. “You can’t promise you won’t die, but promise you won’t be an idiot again.”

“I promise you Victoria, I won’t be an idiot again,” Lucas declares, and he means it, he had acted recklessly and it had almost gotten him killed, he won’t do it again, not when it means that much pain for Vic, Sullivan, and Jennifer. “Jennifer? Did she go home?” 

“She’s been staying at your place, coming to visit you, but you know it’s hard for her to see you on the ventilator,” Vic had been making sure Jennifer was okay throughout the week because they were going to be family soon. “Which reminds me, I need to text her and Sullivan and my mom that you’re awake.” 

Vic shoots them a quick text, Jennifer is on her way to the hospital, as is her mom. Sullivan is busy with paperwork at the moment, but he promises that he’ll stop by in the afternoon. 

“Sullivan?” Lucas sounds hopeful. He still owed Robert that beer, he was hoping the opportunity still stood. 

“He’s been stopping by every time he can, between shifts and on his off time,” Vic assures him. During those hours spent in Luke’s hospital room with Sullivan, he had told her stories, of their time at 88, of what happened with Claire. Vic would say she has tentatively formed a friendship with her captain that was most definitely not there before. “He told me he’d swing by later in the day, Jen and my mom are on their way now.” 

Lucas chokes on the ice chips he’s been slowly eating, he shoots Vic a panicked look. 

“Did you just choke on your ice chips at the thought of meeting my mom?” Vic laughs a full laugh, her first in what feels like a very long time. “She’s not the parent that’s a serial killer.”

“You only get one first impression. Your mom means a lot to you, and I don’t want her to hate me,” Lucas answers honestly. He thinks a meeting with Martin Whitly might be less unnerving because at least his opinion didn’t matter to Vic or Lucas. 

“Technically her first impression of you was while you were intubated,” Vic counters, “If it’s too much I can tell her you’re not feeling up for visitors, she’ll understand.” 

“No, no, I can totally meet your mom, you said she’s excited about the wedding?” 

“Over the moon, I think she was starting to think none of her children were ever going to get married. We’re all older than she and dad were when they got married,” Vic musses, “I hope you don’t mind that she drew up a prenup already, I read over it and I think it’s fair but if you don’t agree we can always change it.” 

“Prenups are good ideas, not that I think we’ll ever use ours because I’m in this till the end, but I’m willing to sign anything for you.” 

“It pretty much just says in case of a divorce you get ten million dollars upfront and another million for every year we were married for, but I get any and all real estate and shares of the family foundation,” Vic explained, she needs him to know what he’s in for. 

“What the fuck,” he yelped. 

“What wrong?” concern clear in her voice. 

“10 million dollars?” 

“I know, honestly it should have been a bit higher, but mom’s lawyers insisted,” Vic sighs, she really hadn’t given the prenup much thought because the thought of ever leaving Lucas was not something that could ever fully compute in her brain, but the prenup was just a formality for her mother. 

“More? Vic baby it’s too much,” 

“Lucas, it really isn’t” 

“Toria, how rich are you?” Lucas figures he has the right to ask that, considering the fact that she thinks ten million dollars isn’t that much, has a private island, a family jet, and that they’re getting married. 

“Uh the Miltons were New York royalty basically, so very,” Vic answers sheepishly. “You really shouldn’t be shocked at this point.” 

“Okay, while I process that, how was your week?” Lucas won’t let her skitter away from her emotional needs by letting himself get distracted. Vic narrows her eye at him and sighs knowing there’s no point in lying. 

“It was complicated, I told Travis, and then Andy found out that same night, it was the first night, but overall it went better than I expected. ” Vic tears up while talking, “The rest of the team found out the next morning, they weren’t happy, and I haven’t talked to them, but according to Trav they’re coming around.” 

“I’m sorry Eggy, I know you didn’t want that.” 

“It’s okay, it was inevitable, I should have told them a while ago, I just didn’t want to lose my family.” Vic had always known that logically, her team would have found out one way or another, it just didn’t make things any easier. “I’m just glad you’re back.” 

Lucas hesitates to speak again, he knows this is always going to be a sensitive topic and he can tell she doesn’t want to talk about this, so he won’t push. Vic’s phone rings, a different ringtone from her usual one—he knows Malcolm, Ainsley, and Jessica each have their special ringtone—and she flinches, it is as if the phone burns her. She lets the call go to voicemail, he doesn’t ask what it's about, and she’s grateful for that. Vic tells him anyway.

“It’s dad,” Vic exhales, her voice trembling a little, “Claremont gave him phone privileges, and now he has my number, which means he won’t stop calling.” 

“Oh Sweetheart,” Lucas squeezes her hand in support and wishes he could sit up to wrap her in a hug, “I’m sorry,” 

“It’s not your fault. I made my choice and I don’t regret it,” Vic makes it very clear. She doesn’t want Lucas blaming himself for her choices, not when it comes to the one she made to save his life. “I’m a big girl, I can handle my father.” 

“You shouldn’t have to.” 

“Speaking of my father,” Vic hesitates, what she’s about to tell him makes her insides churn, “he named his price.” 

“What was it?” Lucas encourages tentatively. He knows he won't like whatever she’s about to tell him.

“He wants a visit, just one visit from the both of us,” Vic hurriedly explains. “You don’t have to do it, I can do it alone, I’m sure he’ll be fine with that.” 

“I’m not letting you go through that alone,” Lucas reassures her. “I hate this, I hate that you have to see him after ten years, but you’re doing it for me, so of course I’ll go with you.” 

Instead of giving him any sort of answer, Vic just kisses him again. There aren’t enough words in the English language to express how much she loves him, how much he means to her, how much he understands her on a fundamental level. 

The noise of someone clearing their throat breaks them apart. 

“Lucas it’s lovely to see you’re awake,” Jessica Whitly stands in the doorway, looking elegant as ever. Lucas goes bright red, Vic facepalms. 

“Mrs. Whitly, it’s a pleasure to meet you, I wish it were under different circumstances,” Lucas tries his hardest to stop blushing and act like the mature adult he is. He’s the Fire Chief of Seattle and he can handle meeting Vic’s mom. 

“Please, we’re going to be family, call me Jessica.” 

“Mom, is that a bag of takeout from Carmelo’s Tacos?” Vic blurts out, both because she wants to take the spotlight off Lucas and because she hasn’t eaten anything all day and Carmelo’s is so good she would kill for their burritos. 

“Yes, I was on my way here with lunch,” Jessia shoves the bag towards Vic as if it burns, “I worry about the amount of takeout you eat, it cannot be healthy.” 

“Hey, at least I eat,” Vic says with a mouthful of burrito, deflecting and distracting Jessica with Malcolm’s issues is a skill she has been honing for a long time. 

Lucas looks at the burrito wishfully. 

“I’m sorry there is no food for you Lucas, I was not aware you would be awake,” Jessica explains. 

“He can’t eat anything other than hospital food anyway, Dr, Pierce said he’s on a diet until his surgery.” 

“I was not aware of this,” Lucas pouts like a little kid. Vic finds it endlessly endearing. 

“Well you’ve been conscious for like 10 minutes and we had other things to talk about,” Vic counters with a smile on her face. “Thank you for lunch, I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast.” 

“I know, you only ate half of the french toast,” Jessica snapped at her. 

“Toria,” Lucas whispers worriedly. He knows she probably spent the entire morning in his hospital room waiting for him to wake up. 

“Sorry,” Vic mumbles. 

“Well, at least you’ll listen to him,” Jessica sighs, it always seems as if none of her children have any self-preservation instincts.

“Hey,” Vic tries to protest, but her mouth is occupied with the process of chewing the best burrito she has ever had. Lucas chuckles. 

“I will say this once because Victoria can take care of herself and you seem like a nice man Lucas, but if you ever hurt her, I will make sure everything her father did looks like child’s play,” Jessica says in a calm tone and finishes with a perfect smile. 

“Then I’ll deserve it,” Lucas agrees. Vic just shoots her mother the glare of the century. 

“Perfect,” Jessica approved, “Now planning a wedding is complicated, but don’t worry about a thing, I have it covered.” 

“Mom, really? Can’t it be a simple wedding? I’d marry him in a courthouse,” Vic chimes in. She is not a hearts and rainbows kind of girl, what matters to her isn’t the wedding, it’s the marriage. 

“Shush Victoria, who knows when I’ll get to plan another wedding with children like your siblings,” Jessica counters. She’s been waiting for this moment for a long time. Vic opened her mouth to protest but before she can get a word in her mother threatens, “I’ll show him all of your childhood photos, including the ones where you’re drooling on top of a horse,”

“I didn’t know there were any pictures of the horse napping adventures, I need to see them,” Lucas has been dying—quite literally—to see photos of Vic napping on a horse. He still finds it unbelievable, and she swears up and down that there are no such pictures. 

“How expensive does the dress have to be for you to burn those photos?” Vic knows the second anyone from Seattle gets those photos they will spread like a wildfire. 

“I’ll send them to you Lucas,” Jessica promises, and Vic groans. 

Vic’s phone pings with a text to the station 19 group chat—the official work group chat—and Vic’s heart falls. 

“What’s wrong?” Lucas asks because he knows how to read her and it can’t be good.

“I’m getting deployed to the LA fires first thing in the morning,” Vic whispers in shock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, but I had to include the wildfires so that Vic can properly clear up things with the team. I promise that the Vicley wedding is coming though. See you all next week (probably depends on how bad my workload is). 
> 
> Fun fact, the island Vic bought is real and it is for sale.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed that, it's going to get a lot more intense, faster than you'd think. 
> 
> Here's the Prodigal Son trailer if you're interested 
> 
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-VY-_iHcT0
> 
> Follow me on Twitter @DXNYARYA for more Station 19/Prodigal Son and other wacky stuff
> 
> Please leave a comment or a kudos it would make me the happiest person alive
> 
> I hope you enjoyed it.


End file.
